Virginia Woolf & Vita
The longest love letter: an entire novel
The writers Virginia Woolf and Vita Sackville-West, whose love inspired "Orlando," the novel Vita's son called "the longest and most charming love letter in literature."
01Why it matters
It is one of the great queer loves of 20th-century literature and a driver of the Bloomsbury circle.
02The conflict
The marriages of both women and Virginia's fragility.
03The iconic moment
Virginia writing "Orlando" as a fantastical portrait of Vita.
04What survived
"Orlando"; the Sissinghurst gardens created by Vita.
05Where to travel
06Frequently asked questions
Why is the story of Virginia Woolf & Vita famous?
It is one of the great queer loves of 20th-century literature and a driver of the Bloomsbury circle.
How does the story of Virginia Woolf & Vita end?
Virginia writing "Orlando" as a fantastical portrait of Vita. "Orlando"; the Sissinghurst gardens created by Vita.
Where can you visit the story of Virginia Woolf & Vita?
You can visit Sissinghurst Castle, in Kent. Vita's gardens.
Related loves
Gabriela Mistral & Doris Dana
The love the letters revealed
The Nobel laureate — the first Latin American woman to win it — and her American companion and translator; their love was revealed by the letters published as "Niña errante" (2010), shattering the myth of the lonely "Saint Gabriela."
Read the story
Simone de Beauvoir & Sartre
A pact of free love that lasted half a century
The philosophers Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre never married or lived together: they made a pact of a "necessary" love open to "contingent" ones, an intellectual, free relationship that lasted 51 years.
Read the story
Oscar Wilde & Bosie
The love that dared not speak its name
The playwright Oscar Wilde and the young aristocrat Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas, whose relationship led Wilde to trial for "gross indecency," two years of hard labor and the ruin that hastened his death.
Read the story