In this week’s DIVA Dating Digest, we take a look at the romance which inspired some of the greatest works in modernist literature
BY ELLA GAUCI, IMAGE BY THUNDERBIRD RELEASING
Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West are one of the most glorious pairings in English literature. The sapphic couple provided the world with some of the greatest works in modernist writing during the 1920s, and both acted as muses for one another.
Writing works such as Mrs Dalloway and To The Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf is often considered one of the most important 20th-century authors of all time. She pioneered the use of stream of consciousness writing in narrative writing, creating vivid and vast worlds within her characters. Vita was also a prolific and successful writer, who also has been remembered for her letters and diaries which give a unique perspective on her life.
The pair have often been described as one of the greatest sapphic love stories of all time. They even inspired the 2018 drama Vita & Virginia which starred Elizabeth Debicki and Gemma Arterton.
But how did they fall in love?
The pair meet at a costume party
Picture the scene. It was December 1922. Virginia Woolf entered the room and Vita was almost immediately enthralled by her. Four days later, Virginia invited Vita over for a dinner party.
“I simply adore Virginia Woolf, and so would you,” Vita wrote to her husband after their second meeting. “You would fall quite flat before her charm and personality.”
Vita continued this letter gushing: “I’ve rarely taken such a fancy to anyone, and I think she likes me. At least, she asked me to Richmond where she lives. Darling, I have quite lost my heart.”
Virginia and Vita begin seeing each other more regularly
We’re lucky that Vita was such an avid diary writer! Over the coming months after their initial introduction, the pair began to see a lot of each other. Vita wrote in her diary in February 1923: “Dined with Virginia at Richmond. She is as delicious as ever. How right she is when she says that love makes anyone a bore, but the excitement of life lies in ‘the little moves’ nearer to people. But perhaps she feels this because she is an experimentalist in humanity, and has no grande passion in her life.”
Vita agrees to publish a book with the Hogarth Press
After a period without communication, Vita and Virginia resumed their dalliance when the former agreed to publish a novel with Woolf’s Press. That book would later be titled Seducers In Ecuador which Vita dedicated to Virginia.
Vita has to leave England to move to Tehran
In 1925, Vita’s husband Harold Nicholson was informed that he was to be posted to the British Legation in Tehran. Vita, naturally, was expected to go with him. This news made Virginia realise how “fond” she had become of her lover, and she went to visit her in Kent before she left. It’s generally believed that it was during this stay that the pair officially became lovers.
On her journey to Tehran, Vita penned a number of love letters while travelling through Italy. “I am reduced to a thing that wants Virginia,” she wrote. “I find it very difficult to look at the coast of Sinai when I am also looking inward and finding the image of Virginia everywhere.”
Their relationship waned in passion
When Vita returned from Tehran, it was clear that something had changed in the nature of their relationship. While they still wrote affectionately to each other – using nicknames to address their letters – it was apparent there was less fire in their love. It’s believed that by 1927 Vita had begun a new love affair with Mary Campbell, wife of the poet Roy Campbell.
Virginia publishes her novel Orlando
In 1928, Virginia Woolf published her highly acclaimed novel Orlando. To show her affection, Virginia based the figure of Orlando on Vita. The novel has been praised for its importance within the canon of LGBTQIA literature as it charts a character who changes gender throughout history.
The day Orlando was published Vita received a pristine copy of the book and Virginia’s original manuscript, custom-bound for Vita with her initials engraved on the spine. Vita’s own son would later describe it as “the longest and most charming love letter in literature.”
The pair drift apart once again
Despite the publication of Orlando, the pair once again drifted out of each other’s lives. Vita went on to buy Sissinghurst Castle in Kent where she spent most of her time, and Virgina remained in London. When World War Two began, the pair spent even less time together.
In 1941, Virginia took her own life. A few years later, Vita wrote to her husband saying: “I still think that I might have saved her if only I had been there and had known the state of mind she was getting into.”
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