Vita Sackville-West

This is a BBC discussion with Nigel Nicholson (son of) discussing why he is selling some of his mothers letters.

Of course, Nigel Nicholson wrote the acclaimed Portrait of a Marriage about his parents marriage and life. I really enjoyed this book and can recommend it heartily.

I find Vita a very complicated person, who was surrounded by extremely complicated people all living in a horrendously complicated time. Can't imagine waking up in that environment but sure would like to travel back with a cloaking device to see what was what ,who was who and check out the area.

Very intelligent , both she and Harold , Harold more so in my opinion considering his work at the Paris Peace Conference and his writing which I enjoy . Given the era , the people and the social situtaion , I can pretty much understand Vita wanting to toss it all and run off with Violet but its tough understanding her passion being so strong that she was considering tossing the kids too. She was in my opinion very self-centered and regretfully, rejected her lovers without much of a blink . One or two wanting to end their lives because of her rejection. Vita "was a piece of work" but a incredibly interesting "piece of work"

Her affair with Violet was white hot and the warmth lingers. If you want to dive deeper try "Mrs Keppel and her Daughter" .. Violet wrote an autobiography called " Don't look Round" which isn't very well written , I don't recommend it also there's not much in it about Vita and the affair.

I think something that explains Vita a lot was the fact that due to the law of the land, she was not allowed to inherit her ancestral home. I think that was possibly her greatest resentment. She seems to have been naturally quite a masculine personality, and I imagine that added to the gaul she felt.

All that and her complex emotional and sexual life, relationships and friendships do all make for interesting reading. I too was always interested in Harold, and in their relationship which I felt was very strong.

And lets not forget her connection with the land and that wonderful garden.

Victoria Glendinning's biography Vita is a very interesting read.

The tv drama with Janet McTeer as Vita and David Haig as Harold was very good:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Portrait-Marriage-DVD-Janet-McTeer/dp/B0010TG1UI/ref=sr_...

I purchased the DVD a year ago and enjoyed it. Your right , their relationship was solid and SO extremely out of sync with the time they lived. All though homosexuality was ramped yet highly secret
(the law being what it was) especially with apostles . Look at Raymond Mortimer he was a very friend of Harolds and many in the Bloomsbury Group + Eddy Sackville-West . RM was quite a man about town.

Vita's not getting Knole was a cruelity in the extreme in my opinion too, it was tragic. I have two copies of "Knole & The Sackvilles" (accidently ordered an extra ) and willing to send to anyone in the group who has interest. Its excellent . just pay the postage

I have Pippeta sitting on my night stand and will start this after I'm finished Virginia's last Diary and get thru Leonards Diaries. Leonards is the last of the original Bloomsburies biographies for me to read.

I'm about to run out of reading material on these folks .. what next?... Maybe Bertie Russell and Francis Partidge