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Woolf sightings: From play reviews to quotes

Monday 21 March 2011 by Paula Maggio

  1. A Young Muse in the Service of Male Writers, New York Times
    And the child is reduced to mere baggage when Ms. Roiphe imagines drowning herself almost the way Virginia Woolf did, but weighted down by offspring rather than stones. “And then,” she adds, “I thought that I had better write something that could stand . . .
  2. Review: “ORLANDO” soars!, ChicagoNow (blog)
    Sarah Ruhl’s adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s Orlando is a wild ride through a whimsical landscape. A place where the individual can thrive without the limitations of time, and where all it takes is a good night’s sleep to change you from man to woman. . . .
  3. Fifty isn’t the new 30, author says, Winston-Salem Journal
    After months of trying to resuscitate her near-comatose career, Jackson sucked it up with the help of a Virginia Woolf quote — “Arrange whatever pieces come your way” — and made a documentary about taking her spoiled teenager to India’s slums . . .
  4. Making Her Mark: Paule Marshall, Patch.com
    She needed, paraphrasing Virginia Woolf, a room of her own. Against the wishes of her husband, she enlisted someone to help with Evan-Keith and rented a small apartment in order to devote more time to her fledgling novel. Two years later, in 1959, . . .
  5. Wry Virginia Woolf in ‘Room’ with view, Kuwait Times
    Don’t be afraid of Virginia Woolf; her work contains a lot of plainspoken “nuggets of truth.” By now we’re pretty familiar with Woolf’s oft-repeated opinion that a woman needs a room of her own in which to write. The one-woman play, “Room,” now being . . . Continue Reading »

Posted in books, Woolf online, Woolf sightings | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment »

Seeing St. Ives and London in Woolf’s time

Sunday 20 March 2011 by Paula Maggio

I’m not sure though that the beauty of the country isn’t its granite hills, and walls, and houses, and not its sea. – Letters II, 462

Imagine this: color film footage of the harbor and streets of St. Ives, Cornwall, and of the streets of London from 1924 to 1926, during Woolf’s time. Imagine something even better: actually viewing this footage online.

The film footage is from Claude Friese-Greene’s The Open Road (1926) a fascinating social record of inter-war Britain.

The St. Ives snippet below is available on the British Film Industry‘s YouTube Channel. Don’t blink though. The video is just 19 seconds long.

First, the back story

In 1924, Friese-Greene borrowed a flash convertible and took a road trip from Land’s End to John O’Groats and back to London, filming along the way using a unique experimental color process developed by him and his father.

The result was three hours of unedited footage — and some of Britain’s first color film footage — that Friese-Green expected to edit into 26 short travelogues that would be shown weekly at the cinema. His film was first shown at trade fairs in 1925.

What happened next

Here’s what happened to Friese-Green’s film:

  • Luckily, the film was preserved. The original negatives were given to the BFI in the late 1950s.
  • The BBC used the footage to produce a three-part documentary co-produced with the BFI and titled The Lost World of Friese-Greene.
  • The BFI National Archive restored a special 65-minute compilation of highlights from the journey, using digital intermediate technology to remove the defects of the original film.

Posted in films, St. Ives | Tagged , , | 5 Comments »

Spring break on the beach at St. Ives

Friday 18 March 2011 by Paula Maggio

Technically, I’m on spring break. I have had a break from teaching and preparing for classes, but I haven’t gone anywhere. No sun, no sand, no waves tickling my toes.

So I pushed my current project aside and took a three-minute beach break in St. Ives, Cornwall, where Virginia Woolf spent her summers until the age of 12.

Join me there now. I’ve got the sunscreen.

Posted in St. Ives | Tagged , , | 4 Comments »

Take a look at Bloomsbury past and present

Thursday 17 March 2011 by Paula Maggio

Watch this video about the Bloomsbury Project, which investigated the growth of Bloomsbury in the 19th century. In it, project director Professor Rosemary Ashton and researcher Dr. Deborah Colville share their research and insights. You’ll also see some interesting video footage. It’s almost as good as being there.

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Stay tuned for Room review

Wednesday 16 March 2011 by Paula Maggio

Laurence is the author of Lily Briscoe's Chinese Eyes

After she attends tonight’s performance of Room, Woolf scholar Patricia Laurence will write a review of the play based on Virginia Woolf’s writing. 

Laurence is is a writer, critic and professor of English at Brooklyn College, the City University of New York.

The play is on stage through March 27 at the  Julia Miles Theater, 424 W. 55th St., and Blogging Woolf readers can get half-price tickets by using the code you will find at this link.

Read more about Woolf’s Room on stage in NY March 12-27.

Posted in play, reviews | Tagged , , | 2 Comments »

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