Virginia Woolf

This was the Google doodle a couple days back.

It's Virginia Woolf. Guess I even clicked on it, because it sparked something. I've read and heard references to her quite a bit......she's known for her strong opinions, independent thinking, intense writing....... an equally intense life, ending with a tragic suicide..... plus she's so stunningly beautiful.

I read on captivated.

Virginia Woolf is regarded as one of Britain's greatest novelists, whose influence on the literary world continues to this day, over a hundred years later.

Her own life is as fascinating. She was born into a highly literate household, and started writing from an early age, and was a prolific and much respected writer of her times, with nine novels to her credit.

She was known to suffer from nervous breakdowns, or what today would be recognized as depression or maybe even schizophrenia.

She drowned herself in a river next to her house when she was 59, leaving a heartbreaking suicide note to her husband which began with "dearest, I feel certain that I am going mad again, and this time I shan't recover.....the happiest times I've known have been what you gave me...".

Some of her well known quotes:

"Though we see the same world, we see it through different eyes."
"Never pretend that the things you haven't got are not worth having."
"Fiction is like a spider's web, attached ever so lightly perhaps, but still attached to life at all four corners." 

"If you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people."

In the same write up I saw that Nicole Kidman had won an Oscar for her portrayal of Virginia in 'The Hours'. Well, I searched, found and watched right away......... one of the most intense, complex and deeply moving films I've watched.