Gardens in the Work of Virginia Woolf - by Karina Jakubowicz (Hardcover)

About the Book

Examines gardens, gardening and horticulture in the work of Virginia Woolf through a cultural and historical lens.

Book Synopsis

This study reads Woolf's fictional gardens in light of her development as a writer, tracing these spaces alongside elements of her personal life and her changing understanding of nature and space. In the course of this work, these locations are revealed to be emotionally and imaginatively charged, acting as vehicles for powerful sentiments and vital intellectual arguments. Through extensive examinations of texts including The Voyage Out, 'Kew Gardens', Jacob's Room, Mrs Dalloway, To the Lighthouse and The Waves, this book frames Woolf's literary gardens as expressive and innovative spheres that formed part of wider early twentieth-century attempts to reimagine nature and domesticity as vibrant, even radical, facets of modern life.

Review Quotes

I learned a great deal from this brilliantly observed investigation of gardens as place, metaphor, inspiration, memorial, origin and more across Woolf's oeuvre. From the remarkable persistence of Kew Gardens to Woolf's queering of literary historical metaphors, Jakubowicz's subtle and well-informed close readings are a real treasure.-- "Mark Hussey, author of Mrs Dalloway: Biography of a Novel"