Ruby Eastwood at the Dublin Review of Books:
The Life of Violet brings together three interconnected short stories written by Woolf in 1907, at the age of twenty-five. They show her beginning to think about something she would return to throughout her career: how to tell the story of a woman’s life. Together, the stories form a spirited, lively mock-biography of her friend Violet Dickinson, a woman famous and beloved in Woolf’s aristocratic circles for her height (6ft 2in) and the humour and kindness she lavished on her friends. She was, from all documentary evidence, a remarkably nice woman, whom Woolf was infatuated with for a time.
The first story, ‘Friendships Gallery’, is a wry, fantastical potted biography, beginning with the birth of Violet, ‘the Giantess’, into a conventional Christian household. It traces her unstoppable growth into young womanhood, culminating in her first dance – though before she goes, her pious aunt issues a cautionary reminder: ‘You are neither beautiful nor wealthy, nor, for anything I can see, in any way attractive; God in his infinite goodness has caused you to grow at least six inches higher than you should grow, and if you are not to be a Maypole of Derision you must see to it that you are a Beacon of Godliness.’
more here.
Enjoying the content on 3QD? Help keep us going by donating now.