In her steps

Updated: 29 September 2009

If you want a new and enhanced understanding of Virginia Woolf’s life and work, spend some time traveling through England in her footsteps.

In June of 2004, I spent 10 days doing just that. And despite the fact that our time was limited and her favorite haunts had changed in the 63 years since she died, it was definitely a trip worth making.

The jaunt was part of a graduate level course fittingly called England in the Steps of Virginia Woolf. It was offered by the University of Alabama at Huntsville, and it was taught by Dr. Rose Norman.

Fifteen of us traveled from London to Kent to Sussex to Cornwall. All along the way, we carried the bible of Woolf travels — Virginia Woolf, Life and London: A Biography of Place by Jean Moorcroft Wilson. Her informative volume didn’t substitute for a map when we wandered down the wrong road, but it did provide plenty of insight and direction along the way.

Visit Woolf places outside of London

• Marilyn Bender shares detailed information about visiting Richmond, where Virginia and Leonard Woolf lived before settling in Sussex in 1919.
• Visit the National Trust Web page to learn more about Monk’s House and Woolf’s writing Lodge in Rodmell, Sussex, as well as Vita Sackville-West’s Knole and Sissinghurst Castle Garden in Kent.
• Find out about touring Charleston Farmhouse, known as Bloomsbury in the country.
• When visiting Sussex, stop in at Berwick Church, decorated by Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant, and Quentin and Angelica Bell.
• After Sussex sightseeing, you’ll need lunch. The Cricketers’ Arms provides a lovely country setting, along with excellent food. It was one of my favorite stops on our trip. And it’s within walking distance of the church. Take a look at the map.
• When visiting Rodmell, Alice Lowe recommends staying at Deep Thatch Cottage. It’s just a few doors down from Monk’s House, she says, “and the accommodations are charming, comfortable and fully equipped.”
• In St. Ives in Cornwall, where the Stephen family spent their summers until Virginia was 12 years old, you can actually stay at the family’s summer home, Talland House.

Visit Woolf’s London

• A walk called “Virginia Woolf’s London” is available as a group booking from Secret London Walks and Visits.
• See Elisa K. Sparks’s map and directions for the Mrs. Dalloway walk.
• Visit Marilyn Bender’s Web page, Virginia Woolf’s London, for details of London Woolf sites and walks.
• 22 Hyde Park Gate: Walk from the High Street Kensington tube station to see the outside of the Kensington home where Woolf was born.
• 24 Hyde Park Gate: Briefly the home of Woolf’s half–sister Stella Duckworth and husband John Waller Hills.
• 46 Gordon Square: Where Woolf and her siblings moved in 1904 after their father’s death.
• 29 Fitzroy Square: Where Woolf lived with brother Adrian in 1907 after Vanessa married Clive Bell and the couple took over 46 Gordon Square. This is the only Bloomsbury home that bears a blue plaque with Woolf’s name.
• 47 Gordon Square: John Maynard Keynes and his wife Lydia Lopokova joined the first floor of this building with #46 to make more room for parties.
• 50 Gordon Square: Where Clive and Vanessa Bell lived, as did Adrian Stephen and his wife Karin Costelloe.
• 51 Gordon Square: Where Lytton Strachey lived for a time.
• Gordon Square: Various members of the Bloomsbury Group lived and worked at various addresses in the square.
• 52 Tavistock Square: Home of Virginia and Leonard Woolf and the Hogarth Press from 1924 to 1939, when the building was destroyed by German bombs. Site now partially occupied by the Tavistock Hotel. Visit nearby Tavistock Square to view the Virginia Woolf Society of Great Britain’s memorial bust of Virginia Woolf and a statue of Ghandi.
• Brunswick Square: House is no longer there, but you can see the site.
• 37 Mecklenburgh Square: The Woolfs’ very last London residence. House is no longer there, but there are other similar houses still standing.

Get personal perspectives on Woolf travel

• Writer Lis Smyth gives an overview of important Woolf places in “Around the Houses” in The Australian.
• Share one writer’s views about why the sea air and the sound of the waves at Woolf’s beloved St. Ives in Cornwall is calming and rejuvenating.
• Read a blogger’s experience on the July 2009 Charleston Trust walk “In the Footsteps of Virginia Woolf,” an eight-mile trek across the Downs from Monk’s House to Charleston.

Read about Woolf and place

• Take a look at a six-day itinerary on the Virginia Woolf Literary Tour page.
• Read Sonita Sarker’s views on “Locating a Native Englishness in Virginia Woolf’s The London Scene.”
• Get Daphne Merkin’s perspective on Cornwall in her Sept. 12, 2004, New York Times article “To the Lighthouse and Beyond.”
• Enjoy Woolf’s own words about her favorite big city in The London Scene. Snowbooks published the illustrated hardback edition, complete with all six of Woolf’s original essays, in 2004.

Visit Woolf’s London in virtual reality

At first glance, Woolfians appear to be notoriously low-tech. But Todd Kuchta, assistant professor of English at Western Michigan University, brought a welcome high-tech element to the 17th Annual International Conference on Virginia Woolf.

His conference presentation, “Teaching Mrs. Dalloway’s London in Virtual Reality,” showed off the virtual reality version of Woolf’s London that he created as a teaching and learning aid. Students, teachers and common readers can follow Woolf through London on his site.

This page has the following sub pages.

• Follow Woolf to Ireland