Perhaps those who are doing the course/class/night school/module/replacement for Yoga for Beginniners, could indicate when they have finished reading NIGHT AND DAY please ? There are a lot of things to say about it.  But whether or not you have finished, you could ponder this.

VW more or less disowned the novel later. She had never really liked it, she said. You will find quite a bit about that in A WRITER`S DIARY and in various letters. But is this relevant to us, reading it now ? Does it matter what she thought and that she regarded it as a failure ?

A novel I wrote which I dislike now, and which I do not think convinces at all, won the Whitbread Prize and was shortlisted for Booker. It has not sold as well as my others by any means, so perhaps people agree with me not the judges. Does it matter what I think ?

A book, once it has left its author, goes on its way through the world to seek its fortune alone. As a Post modernist, I have to say that what VW thought does not matter a jot - it mattered to her but that should not affect our reading of it.

And yet.. she was surely her own best critic, as I am mine.

I find myself with a foot in both camps.

I would like you to read what she says about N and D both while she was writing it, and afterwards. But only once you have finished the novel.

For those who are just getting underway with this... the chapter when the book soars up, from a  slightly leaden first half, is CHAPTER FIFTEEN. Something happens to VW`s writing in this chapter. I think she fell in love with her characters from inside, and was no longer just describing them rather flatly as an outside observer. She also found a scene and a setting which she could 'paint' rather than just describe. She has a very visual sensibility - doubtless she learned much froher painter sister Vanessa, as well as from her own observations and converstions of, and about, paintings and painters.

If you feel you are plodding a little, plod on until Chapter 15...

Those who have embarked on NIGHT AND DAY might bear in mind that VW had a very good sense of humour. There are numerous references to it in letters and diaries of others, and she shows a nice sharp wit in her own. But there is a wonderfully funny account of the two ladies - Katharine Hilbery and her mother - trying to write the biography of their great and famous poet ancestor, Richard Hilbery - see Chapter 3. It pokes fun at Katharine`s mother especially, and Katharine`s despairing attempts to keep her mother focused on the job in hand and make some sort of order out of all the wafty and irrelevant paragraphs and notes are laugh-aloud stuff. Not something anyone anticipates in VW.

What you need to do with this book is to see it as a plain, straightforward Victorian/Edwardian story. Because after it we will begin to look at how she sets off in her small bark through dangerous waters - unsure if she could even row - towards the 20th century and her own view of the novel But remember - we know what happened, what she wrote, what others made of it. She did not.

She has to leave the safety and solidity of the novel form as it had always been, as N and D is, like a young person leaving home for an uncertain future.

But for now, look at what she COULD do and did. And one hint - the novel moves nicely evenly along all the time - but it does not take flight until almost half way through.

We will be reading NIGHT AND DAY next and I would also like you to read Jeanettte Winterson on VW on her website. Here is the link.

http://www.jeanettewinterson.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=249

Jeanette, like me, loves VW and believes her to be a truthful and important writer, a genius. She is very good at putting passion into her explanations which is why I suggest you  read this.  JW is the General Editor of the Vintage  edition of VW and if you want to buy any one edition, choose this for the introductions. I have to declare an interest as I wrote the one for this edition of THE YEARS which we will come to much later.

I suggest you might like to read Chapter Nine of the Lyndall Gordon biography, THE TRIAL OF LOVE at some point soon. VW is one of those writers whose life is fascinating in and for itself - even if she had not been a writer. The period is interesting, the other people she knew are interesting, her personality and psychology are interesting. So don`t look for clues to the novels in the life, do the reverse.

As we progress the life will become less important in relation to the novels, which come to stand on their own feet more and more. But for now, we need to move from Virginia Stephen - with everything that implies - to the first years of Virginia Woolf.

The next module, which is what we now call Lessons, will go up later today. I am a bit frantic sorting out orders for HEROINES. THE BOLD, THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL and I must get Forensics to check for the DNA on that Crossbow.

We will move forward now from TVO - but if anyone else has anything to discuss about that, you have until early this evening, whe your work must be handed it, written or typed on one side of the page only and any essays with chocolate smears will be returned UNMARKED.

You all have till FRIDAY to finish the chapter of Gordon and The Voyage Out. Then we shall be moving on. I`ll put up a para or two about TVO and all comments etc welcome.

If anyone has the OXford World`s Classics edition of TVO, the Introduction by Lorna Sage is well worth reading. But don`t feel you have to if you have a different edition.

Would people please let me know when they are ready for the next of this course ?

I plan to say something about the Part 1 and the books/reading for it, and then move on but I don`t want to rush anyone. There is no hurry. I will also put up a book list - so that you know in advance what I`ll be talking about and what you`ll need to get hold of from libraries/bookshops.  It will be added to over the course of the autumn/winter so you won`t have to get everything at once.

I won`t move on until everyone feels ready, so don`t worry those sitting at the back - which means you, Lynne and Philippa.

I hope everyone can get hold of the Lyndall Gordon biography and the novel. The idea is for you to erase everything you know about VW from your mind and start afresh.

The Voyage Out is her first novel. Read it as such. You might make a note of other first novels by young women in their twenties - from any period - and when you have read TVO, see how they compare. Is she a confident writer ? Does the book seem very far removed from us now, as readers and just as people living in 2006 ?

Did you find anything dragging ? Is there any naivete there, or lack of certainty in the style.. was she feeling her way ? Is this a young writer whose future you would feel sure about ? Which way would you expect her to go in future novels ?

But this isn`t a test.. settle back and enjoy the novel. I hope an exchange of views will start. Let me know if the comment section does not seem adequate for this - but it should be fine. 

I think a couple of weeks should see everyone through the novel and the chapter of Gordon, but don`t feel there is any rush. We can allow another week. The Woolf for Dummies is an autumn and winter Evening Class after all.. and you don`t even have to leave the house.