‘Think of a book as a very dangerous and exciting game, which it takes two to play at.’

For Virginia Woolf, reading wasn’t a passive act. It requires guts and ingenuity. At times one is locked in combat with a book, at others one is the ‘accomplice’ of a writer, like an accomplice to crime, aiding an act of daring imagination. Few people read as closely, as critically and joyfully as Virginia Woolf. For her, books were real relationships – and she famously dedicated Orlando to some of her favourite historical writers as well as her friends.

To talk about Woolf as a reader, Jonty is joined by author and scholar Alexandra Harris. Alexandra is author of the acclaimed Romantic Moderns: English Writers, Artists and Imagination from Virginia Woolf to John Piper, Weatherland, The Rising Down and a study of Virginia Woolf. She is currently writing a book all about Virginia Woolf’s life as a reader.

Together, Alexandra and Jonty talk about Virginia Woolf’s unique philosophy of reading and discuss some of her favourite books.

Further reading:

• Romantic Moderns: English Writers, Artists and Imagination from Virginia Woolf to John Piper (Thames & Hudson, 2023) by Alexandra Harris
• Virginia Woolf (Thames & Hudson, 2024) by Alexandra Harris
• The Rising Down (Faber & Faber, 2024) by Alexandra Harris
• Weatherland: Writers and Artists Under English Skies (Thames & Hudson, 2015)

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