"I don't think two people could have been happier than we were." This is the love story between Virginia and Leonard Woolf.

Of the relationship between Leonard and Virginia Woolf are wonderful portraits in his diaries. In his lines we find the days spent writing, the misunderstandings, but above all the sense of helplessness of a love that would like to be salvation but is aware that it cannot. And living with a woman who is overwhelmed by immense pain is the most arduous act a human can undertake.

It was in January 1912 that Leonard Woolf realized he was in love with Virginia Stephen, whom he had been seeing for several months and telegraphed her announcing his arrival. The two met, he asks her to marry him. Virginia, not ready to answer asks for time to get to know him better. Leonard writes her more letters during the next days.

<blockquote>
 "You may be vain, selfish, insincere, as you say, but that is nothing compared to your high qualities, greatness, intelligence, spirit , beauty, frankness. After all, we like being together, we like the same things and the same people, we are both intelligent and above all it is the real things that we understand and that are important to us".
</blockquote>
Shortly after he wrote those lines the two were married and remained together for almost 30 years.
In 1930, Virginia wrote in one of her letters: 
<blockquote>
 'I was pleased that Leonard said the other night that he loves me more than I love him. He said that he depends on our life together more than I do, that I live in a world of my own. Then we quarrelled. It made me happy to think how much he needs me."
</blockquote>

In very few sentences we find the 'rules of attraction' of this mythical couple.
If we look at things from the point of view of 'domestic economy' we see her as the fragile and insecure one, who lives in 'a world of her own', while he is the solid one, who knows how to count, how to keep the shack standing, in practice to protect the fortress within which Virginia can devote herself to her true great love, literature.
If, on the other hand, the visual angle is that of the love relationship, the parts are reversed: he is the insecure one, the one who needs confirmation, she is the one who finds strength - or at least consolation - in her husband's insecurities.
Then the situation precipitates.&nbsp;

'I can no longer fight': Virginia Woolf's farewell letter

On 28 March 1941, Virginia Woolf, suffering yet another mental breakdown, said goodbye to life by letting herself go with her pockets full of stones into the River Ouse.
She was fifty-nine years old, Virginia Woolf, on the morning of 28 March 1941, when she decided to set off towards the River Ouse never to return to her home. It is in Rodmell, Sussex: there the writer has taken refuge with her husband Leonard Woolf to escape the bombings that make London an earthly hell. She walks, Virginia. She walks and fills her pockets with stones. When she reaches the waterway, she abandons her cane and walks again, letting herself go into the river. Thus the modernist author says goodbye to life, tried by yet another mental breakdown. To her husband Leonard, who has always been close and loving in the face of every crisis, she leaves a last heart-rending letter:

<blockquote>
 Dearest,
 I'm sure I'm going mad again. I feel that we cannot face another one of those terrible moments. And this time I won't get better. I start hearing voices, and I can't concentrate. So I'm doing what seems like the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You were in every way everything no one could ever be. I don't think two people could have been happier until this terrible illness came along. 
 I can't fight anymore. I know that I am ruining your life, that without me you could go on. And you will, I know it. You see, I can't even write properly. I can't read. What I want to tell you is that I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been completely patient with me, and incredibly good. I want to say it - everyone knows it. If anyone could have saved me, it would have been you. Everything is gone from me except the certainty of your goodness. I can't keep ruining your life. I don't think two people could have been happier than we were.
 V.
</blockquote>

These are the writer's last words. These are her last hours. "For many days Virginia was neither dead nor alive. She was missing. She had disappeared. 'Missing' wrote the newspapers."

Happiness in writing

When she was well Virginia wrote, it was the only thing that made her happy, she would write reviews and essays as well as novels, working every day with a kind of tormented intensity. She wrote only in the morning, from ten to one, but she kept thinking about it for the rest of the day.
She put her whole self into her writing. She would write and rewrite from cover to cover five or six times, even the reviews for the Times or the Guardian. Every time she finished a book, however, she would find herself in such a deep state of mental exhaustion that she would be under the threat of a breakdown for weeks.
she was not afraid to show a certain insecurity. She did not hide it, she did not mask it. Because, as Bukowski said: "bad writers tend to be self-confident, whereas it is good writers who have doubts".

The genius of this woman &nbsp;is truly broad, ranging from writing to politics, art, history and philosophy. She also committed herself to supporting the education of female workers by giving evening tutorials at a suburban boarding school where she was active in the suffragette groups, contributing to changing the role of women in society who were then more than now subjugated by the male figure.&nbsp;
But, the last words of this great author, are taken from her autobiography, which has come down to us and has never been revised and, perhaps, for this reason, is even more authentic, it is an even more sedimented thought, at least I think so: An idea that has always accompanied me is that beneath the wadding there is a design; that we, all of us human beings, are connected to this design; that the whole world is a work of art, of which we are part of Macbeth, or a Beethoven quartet, is the truth about this immensity we call the world. But there is no Shakespeare, no Beethoven, certainly and clearly no God; we are the words; we are the music; we are the things themselves.

Genius & Madness: "My Life with Virginia Woolf"

Tags

Recommended posts for you

Fashion

Timeless Elegance, Sustainable Luxury: In Conversation with Victoria Maksheeva-Khassanova

Fashion

Downtown Muse: A Love Letter to New York

Art & Culture

Rita Sabo "Sacred Planet": Art in the Name of Sustainability

Travel & Gourmet

Ruby Bea Hotel: Where Renaissance Meets Modern Luxury

Fashion

Shadows of Power

Fashion

Timeless Loungewear for Festive Moments

Travel & Gourmet

Maxx Royal: The Definition Of a Luxury Holiday Takes On a Whole New Meaning

News & Events

The Editor’s Letter: The Empowerment Issue