Re-read January 2016.

April 2015:
Thoughts on "Reminiscences," the opening piece, are on my blog here: http://proustitute.wordpress.com/2015/04/10/virginia-woolfs-reminiscences-figuri...

I'll likely write about the other pieces collected in this wonderful collection individually, in the depth they deserve. And I'll try to remember to update this when those are up on the blog, but the link is there now in case you want to check back. ( )

I really enjoyed this memoir. I'll admit I didn't read the editor notes or the introductions, but I feel like those were a waste of time to get to the good stuff, reading about Virginia Woolf's life in her own words. It's a very hunting look into her past and you can see where she got some ideas for her novels. I highly recommend this to people who enjoy Virginia Woolf's novels or to people who what to know more about her and her life.

UPDATE: I should note this book goes into some heavy topics, so there should be a trigger warning with this book. ( )

"We are the words; we are the music; we are the thing itself." Published years after her death, Moments of Being is "the single most moving and beautiful thing that Virginia Woolf ever wrote about her own life" (The New York Times) and her only autobiographical writing.

This collection of five pieces written for different audiences spanning almost four decades reveals the remarkable unity of Virginia Woolf's art, thought, and sensibility. "Reminiscences," written during her apprenticeship period, exposes the childhood shared by Woolf and her sister, Vanessa, while "A sketch of the Past" illuminates the relationship with her father, Leslie Stephens, who played a crucial role in her development as an individual a writer. Of the final three pieces, composed for the Memoir Club, which required absolute candor of its members, two show Woolf at the threshold of artistic maturity and one shows a confident writer poking fun at her own foibles.

This is a fascinating collection of private notes, typed reminiscences, and other writings not intended to be published. There are scenes from Virginia Woolf's childhood in London and at her family's summer house in St. Ives on the Cornwall coast, as well as from her Bloomsbury days.
I learned much about the background for To the Lighthouse, The Waves, and her other books by reading this collection. ( )

Publicada póstumamente en 1976, Momentos de vida es la única obra autobiográfica de Virginia Woolf. Los seis textos que conforman el libro fueron encontrados a la muerte de su marido, Leonard Woolf, en su archivo, y constituyen un viaje cronológico por los momentos álgidos de la vida de la gran escritora: desde su infancia y su adolescencia hasta los orígenes del grupo de Bloomsbury, pasando por el despertar de su vocación o el análisis de su relación con la Historia. Un magnífico memorial a un mundo desaparecido: el que precedió a la Segunda Guerra Mundial. ( )