Orlando: A Biography

The most brilliant portrayal of a transsexual experience in modern history. Even when Magnus Hirshfield was publishing his treatise on the transsexual phenomenah, Woolf relates an account of the intracies of gender identity undiscovered by social scientists and biologists. Published in 1928, Orlando has been billed as one of Woolf's best imaginative works however, such criticism was never seen in the light of reality but a surreal depiction of the writer's portrayal of a young man who wakes up one day as a woman, as if in the ordinary course of his life. As Woolf suggests of her character's reaction to the change "Orlando herself showed no surprise at it.(Woolf, 139. Modern transsexuals have explained only recently in their writings, their internal thinking stays the same, only the external body appears different to others. ALthough Woolf's work set the precedent for post modernist literature, infusing elements of fiction into biography, she weaves the internal stuggle of her former lover, Vita Sachville-West's life, together with her own perceptions of gender and sexuality, with an historical account of a young transsexual aristocrat's adventures over the span of centuries. Unlike a biography of her time, the action is secondary to the internal story. This is more of an account of how her lover (and as suggested by this author--Woolf herself), struggles with her own gender identity; a thinking so similar to transsexualism and conflict with a Eurocentric binary gender…

I could see how some would really enjoy this book, especially as a classical example of British Literature by Virginia Wolfe, an iconic British writer. That being said, I did not find it interesting and thought it progressed very slowly with an unclear plot and character progression. Stopped reading about halfway through. I'll still give it 4 stars, however, because it is definitely enjoyable by some.

I was struggling to read. V. W. Composes these lovely long descriptive pages Full of metaphors, etc. then it would spring back to passages that wouldn’t seem to be connected. Watching the film! helped enormously and I was able to finish the book. She’s an amazing writer.