Virginia Woolf was born Adeline Virginia Stephen to Sir Leslie Stephen and Julia Stephen on January 25, 1882. Due to her parents’ family background, Virginia grew up along with her seven siblings in a household heavily influenced by the Victorian literary society. Supplementing these influences was the immense library at the Stephens’ house, from which Virginia and her sister, Vanessa were taught the classics and English literature. Her studies, however, were interrupted by the sudden death of her mother in 1895, her half-sister Stella in 1897, and her father in 1904. This, along with the sexual abuse she and Vanessa were subjected to by their half-brothers, triggered some of Virginia’s most alarming mental breakdowns. Consequently, Virginia was plagued by periodic mood swings throughout her life. But despite being briefly institutionalized, she was able to take courses of study in language and history at the Ladies’ Department of King’s College London between 1897 and 1901. Here she met some of the early reformers of women’s higher education such as the principal of the Ladies’ Department, Lilian Faithfull and other strong female personalities that influenced her own feminist nature.

 

Though her mental instability constantly affected her social life, it did not hinder her literary productivity. Her works include Mrs. Dalloway (1925), To The Lighthouse (1927), and The New Dress (1927). These novels and short stories were mostly published by Hogarth Press, which was co-founded with her husband, Leonard Woolf, whom she married on August 10, 1912. Due to her experimentation with the stream of consciousness and underlying psychological and emotional motives of the characters in her works, Virginia is considered as major innovator in the English language. She, along with other notable writers, such as Lytton Strachey, Clive Bell, Rupert Brooke, Saxon Sydney-Turner, Duncan Grant, Leonard Woolf, and others formed the nucleus of the intellectual circle of writers and artists known as the Bloomsbury Group.

 

After completing the manuscript of her last novel, Between the Acts, Virginia became deeply depressed. The onset of World War II, the destruction of her London home during the Blitz among other things worsened her condition until she was able to work. On March 28, 1941, Virginia drowned herself after writing a final letter to her husband by filling her overcoat with stones and walking into the River Ouse near her home. Her body was not found until April 18, 1941 and her cremated remains were buried under an elm in the garden of Monk’s House, their home in Rodmell, Sussex.