{"id":8529,"date":"2021-03-28T15:29:08","date_gmt":"2021-03-28T13:29:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/?p=8529"},"modified":"2021-05-24T15:46:39","modified_gmt":"2021-05-24T13:46:39","slug":"eighty-years-ago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/?p=8529","title":{"rendered":"Eighty years ago, and a last walk&#8230;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image wp-duotone-1a1a1a-fff-1\"><figure class=\"alignright size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Virginia_Woolf#\/media\/File:Handwriting-virginia-woolf-10921544-600-870.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Handwriting-virginia-woolf-10921544-600-870.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-8533\" width=\"240\" height=\"348\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Handwriting-virginia-woolf-10921544-600-870.jpg 480w, https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Handwriting-virginia-woolf-10921544-600-870-207x300.jpg 207w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 240px) 85vw, 240px\" \/><\/a><figcaption>Virginia Woolf&#8217;s letter to Leonard written a few days previously.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On Friday 28th March, 1941, Virginia Woolf walked across the downs to the flooding River Ouse near her beloved home in Sussex, as she would have done so many, many times before; but on this day she filled her coat pockets with stones aplenty and just kept on walking into the watery depths.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On her desk she had left a note to Leonard, written a few days previously. Her body was not found until the 18th April. In the midst of war and tormented by mental illness and personal anguish, Virginia Woolf departed the mortal world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Juliet Stevenson reads Virginia Woolf&#039;s suicide note\" width=\"840\" height=\"473\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-ze0p4kDqHE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><figcaption>Juliet Stevenson reading Virginia Woolf&#8217;s suicide note.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Not long ago I dug up <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/magazine\/1954\/03\/06\/a-consciousness-of-reality\" target=\"_blank\">this review <\/a> at <em>The New Yorker<\/em> by <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/W._H._Auden#Reputation_and_influence\" target=\"_blank\">W.H. Auden<\/a> of the so-called &#8220;Writer&#8217;s Diary&#8221; published in 1954 &#8211; and admiring and generous it indeed is, of Woolf in particular but also of a neglected generation of women writers in general. I don&#8217;t think Auden lived long enough to read the whole kit and caboodle; which I suggest would have delighted him even more. He finished his piece thus:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>I do not know how Virginia Woolf is thought of by the younger literary generation; I do know that by my own, even in the palmiest days of social consciousness, she was admired and loved much more than she realized. I do not know if she is going to exert an influence on the future development of the novel\u2014I rather suspect that her style and her vision were so unique that influence would only result in tame imitation\u2014but I cannot imagine a time, however bleak, or a writer, whatever his school, when and for whom her devotion to her art, her industry, her severity with herself\u2014above all, her passionate love, not only or chiefly for the big moments of life but also for its daily humdrum \u201csausage-and-haddock\u201d details\u2014will not remain an example that is at once an inspiration and a judge.&nbsp;[&#8230;]<\/p><cite>&#8220;A Consciousness of Reality&#8221; by&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/contributors\/w-h-auden\">W. H. Auden<\/a> in March 6, 1954 issue of &#8220;<em>The New Yorker<\/em>&#8220;.<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In retrospect, Auden would perhaps have been surprised at just how profound and enduring Woolf&#8217;s influence has been on following generations of writers and readers alike, and that it is an influence that is intrinsically emotional and psychological rather than stylistic &#8211; for most know only too well, that to be so tempted would certainly end in, what Auden rightly predicted as, &#8220;tame imitation&#8221;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On Friday 28th March, 1941, Virginia Woolf walked across the downs to the flooding River Ouse near her beloved home in Sussex, as she would have done so many, many times before; but on this day she filled her coat pockets with stones aplenty and just kept on walking into the watery depths. On her &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/?p=8529\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Eighty years ago, and a last walk&#8230;&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8530,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[22],"tags":[222,136],"class_list":["post-8529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-virginia-woolf","tag-juliet-stevenson","tag-virginia-woolf"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/640px-Southease_River_Ouse_north-e1616938286676.jpg","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8529"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8529\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9484,"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8529\/revisions\/9484"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stolb01web.ddns.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}