-Quentin Bell: Virginia Woolf A Biography, Harcourt Books, 1972, Pp. 314-

Virginia Woolf: The Scrutiny of Her Depiction

The nephew of Virginia Woolf, Quentin Bell, does his best to define and reveal whom his aunt was, but I did not get what I wanted from Bell’s book. In my accounts of reading Virginia Woolf’s writings like “To the Lighthouse” and “Mrs. Dalloway”, I found myself captivated by Woolf’s observant and insightful mind that seemed to clearly see into itself and the minds of others including those in her family. Many of Woolf’s works alluded to views of distributive justice, socioeconomic processes, social exclusion, and assessments of patriarchy, but what I found in this biography was a person who appeared to be self-centered, and difficult to understand. Although Bell saw her as an elegant women with a brilliant mind that at times sporadically had nervous breakdowns it seemed that too often her brilliance didn’t come through to me because Bell failed to do what Woolf did in her writings, which was to create an image of a character that revealed her [Woolf’s] nature without constantly having to remind me. Both Bell and Woolf had great minds and an excellent sense of artistry, so it is unfair to compare Quentin Bell to Virginia Woolf. So my critique is not of Quentin Bell as a person, but his ideas of who Virginia Woolf was. And in this case Bell has plenty of insight on Woolf but tends to focus on details and journals in her life that do not help to truly resonate who Virginia Woolf was as a modernist and social thinker.
The book was written with lots of detail that carries loads of information about Woolf’s life, but Bell’s information all seemed to come from the material of Virginia's letters. Which makes you wonder what information you are actually getting from Bell. I assume he was allowing the reader to see Woolf’s interpretations of everyone she ever associated with, while also allowing you to reference certain items on every page. But many of these journals reference little items and events in her life that really do not express her feminist thought or influence on social elitism. They tend to portray Virginia’s “everyday” thoughts, and also her feelings on those in the Bloomsbury Group, an influential group of philosophers and writers who were united by the belief of the importance of art and the affect it had on modern ideas in the 20th century (Bell p.94). At one point in the book a couple members from the group were having lunch in a lodging house right outside of Bloomsbury, London in which Virginia started off a slight conversation on when she studied at Cambridge she at times struggled with Shakespeare. As a modernist thinker in London she aimed for women to be able to be a part of higher education, but in America it wasn’t until 1972 when gender discrimination was banned in higher education (Foner p.814). So because she struggled with Shakespeare she considered herself to be ill-educated and felt that this was an injury inflicted on her by reason of her sex (Bell p.70).
As a reader one thinks this “influential” group is about to chat about the social inequalities of sexism, but surprisingly Bell randomly switches to how at times Virginia’s imagination could be easily “easily stirred” (Bell p.71). He goes on to explain how a simple question Virginia asked about what pudding they would be eating at the luncheon would send her thought into rapid fire, “Virginia’s imagination took fire; she saw how it would be and seeing could not but describe her vision, her exact words are lost; but there was something about a soaring convexity of chocolate surmounted, crowned with banners of crystallized jelly and creamy foam. (Bell p.73)” Though it is interesting to know that her mind was so scattered and her visions were so broad, knowing about her vision of pudding doesn’t help illustrate the real complexities of the content of her thinking. What it seems Bell is content with and comfortable discussing is the Bloomsbury group. But his downfall in this biography is that he really wants you to know about all these people, and their lives and how they connected to Woolf, at times straying away from whom the biography is about. Throughout the biography I feel as if Bell essentializes on the facets of her life that she was not known for, like the way she dresses, and her day-to-day stresses. So as a reader one feels left out on the social concepts of her life that she is known for.
Virginia Woolf’s sexuality and mental illness have often been spoken about when reflecting on whom she was. But in the biography many parts about Virginia's sexual abuse at the hands of her brother George are briefly touched on and ignored. Bell rarely talks about the sexuality of her life, and one can accuse him to be avoiding guilt of the family’s sexual assault and the possibility of Woolf not being “fully” heterosexual. It would have been extremely hard for her to say she was gay during that time period, especially since (though this is in America) it wasn’t until the 1960’s when gay people really started to “come out of the closet” and demand antidiscrimination laws (Foner p.814). I remember Bell calling Woolf "frigid", not even talking about her relationship with her husband or her passionate friendships with women. Woolf was a modernist feminist so one would think that her relationships with women would be a primary aspect in her biography. When touching on Virginia’s relationship with her brother Bell states “George, vexed with Virginia, and no doubt by his own social folly in taking his sister to such an entertainment, insisted nevertheless that the social duties of the evening were not over. (Bell p.160) ” He clearly seems to be uncomfortable with events that might of happened, but he never once says that the sexual abuse does happen. He makes Virginia the victim of something the reader cannot grasp because he defines George’s acts as “whatever” or “social ambitions.” “She saw herself as the defenseless victim of George’s social ambitions; she was snubbed, bullied, and compelled to jump like a lame dog through whatever circus hoops he might place before her. (Bell p.162)”
Bell treats a monumentally important part of Virginia's life [sexuality] as something that is just an annoying and forgettable feature, and then focuses on her kindness, by saying “There was much in Good Society that she found hateful and freighting; but there was always something in it that she loved. (Bell p.170)” To me he is subjugating and oppressing her emotions and reflections of her brothers encounters just to examine her benevolence and sympathy for herself. He does not focus on the real problem, which was the sexual abuse in her life. This reminds me of white middle class women’s suffrage groups trying to gain the vote for themselves because they saw themselves as the “inferior race” (Foner p.528), instead of focuses on the real task, which was gaining the vote for all women. Both detail forms of patriarchy and hierarchy. And what I have learned about Virginia Woolf is that she was a strong woman because she was able to write about intimate relationships that dealt with sexuality and sexism, not shy away from the topic.
Something else Bell generally seemed uncomfortable with discussing was Woolf’s mental illness. He never really offers any real explanation for why she had so many breakdowns in her life. But he does recognize through Virginia and Leonard Woolf’s diaries that there was multiple things that caused her to feel depressed so often, like the stress of their marriage, the novels she was writing, and just the “every day strain of living” as he calls it. “It is the novel which has broken her up…they would tease her and she got desperate and came here a wreck. (Bell p.234)” What proves that he might have been uncomfortable with really delving into her mental and overall sexual life is that he is aware of situations in her life that might of really been reasons for her mental illnesses, for example “one of the difficulties of the situation [mental breakdown] was that Jean Thomas felt an unconscious but violent homosexual passion for Virginia, this made her awkward. (Bell p.235)” It seems Bell has the chance to say what this awkwardness might have been but he just simply chooses not to do so, so once again the reader is left to wonder what really was Woolf’s mental breakdowns.
In many parts of this book I feel like I have missed tangible knowledge of what Virginia Woolf’s social thoughts, theories and values were, but one thing I think Bell did do well was displaying Woolf’s attitude towards people. What I gained from other books and writings by her is that she was against social elitism no matter what gender. But what Bell portrayed in her diaries was that she was jealous of most artistic success, and talked about everyone behind their backs, especially if they were poor or not as smart as her. What was different then what I knew about her is that it seemed as if she didn’t care about the lower social classes. To me she had a Charles Darwin “On the Origin of Species” mentality (Foner p.498), in that she was better adapted to life than the people around her, especially Jewish people. In a letter she sent to Ethel Smyth (a leader in the women’s suffrage movement) she said, “ How I hated marrying a Jew- What a snob I was, for they have immense vitality. (Bell p.151)” A women that had so much pride in deviating from patriarchal values really seemed to have problems within social spheres of prejudice and class consciousness. Bell in a way showed that though she was brilliant she was still ignorant in some ways, and her slips of ignorance reminded me of those who have it better than others tend to forget about the problems of those who have less. Like when America decided to be in WWII, and demanded that African-Americans should fight for their country but at home there was still major racism and segregation (Foner p.692). Even though I think Bell misses out on representing a couple of major facets of her life he does give you a really good day to day account of her mood and hidden elitisms, but never completely analyzes why she was the way she was.
Quentin Bell is an excellent writer and artist of his own nature and is a brilliant man, but the biography he has written about his aunt Virginia Woolf is lacking the representation to really describe important components of her life. The book gives you great knowledge of so many people that were involved in her life, and their thoughts of her writings but as a reader you never get the essence that you actually learned something about her views and values. Virginia Woolf was a great writer, a great mind, and a great woman that represented true feminist ideals and principles. Quentin Bell’s literature on her didn’t justly develop or portray the influential woman that she was in all of society.

Works Cited:
Bell, Quentin. Virginia Woolf; a Biography. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1972. Print.
Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty!: An American History. New York: W.W. Norton, 2006. Print.