Virginia Woolf (1882-1941)

1882: Birth of Viginia Woolf in London, in an upper-middle class family.

1895: Death of her mother. She has the first of many nervous breakdowns.

1897: Death of half-sister, Stella. Learning Greek and History at King’s College London.

1904: Death of her father. First publication in The Guardian.

1905: Beginning of her professional writing career.

1907: Marriage of sister Vanessa to Clive Bell. Working on her first novel (to become The Voyage Out).

1908: She visits Italy.

1910: Works for women’s suffrage. Birth of the Bloomsbury Group, a circle of writers and intellectuals that begins to meet informally at the Bells' home.

1912: She marries Leonard Woolf. Travels for honeymoon to Provence, Spain, and Italy.

1913: Mental illness and her first attempted suicide. Put in care of husband and nurses.

1915: Purchase of Hogarth House, Richmond. The Voyage Out is published. Another bout of violent madness.

1917: First publication of Monday or Tuesday.

1919: Publication of Night and Day.

1921: Publication of The Mark on the Wall.

1922: Publication of Jacob’s Room.

1925: Publication of The Common Reader [essays] and Mrs Dalloway, her greatest novel.

1928: Publication of Orlando.

1929: Publication of A Room of One’s Own.

1940: The Woolf’s house and press offices are destroyed during the Nazis bombing.

March 1941: Virgina Woolf’s suicide

1953: Publication of her final novel, Between the Acts.