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The Woolfs spent parts of the period of the [[First World War]] in Asham, but were obliged by the owner to leave in 1919.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|p=346,416}} "In despair" they purchased the Round House in Lewes, a converted windmill, for £300. No sooner had they bought the Round House, than [[Monk's House]] in nearby [[Rodmell]] came up for auction, a [[weatherboarded]] house with oak-beamed rooms, said to date from the 15th or 16th century.{{sfn|Woolf|1964|p=61}} The Woolfs sold the Round House and purchased Monk's House for £700.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|p=67}} Monk's House also lacked running water, but came with an acre of garden, and had a view across the Ouse towards the hills of the [[South Downs]]. Leonard Woolf describes this view as being unchanged since the days of [[Chaucer]].{{sfn|Eagle|Carnell|1981|p=228}} The Woolfs would retain Monk's House until the end of Virginia's life; it became their permanent home after their London home was bombed, and it was where she completed ''[[Between the Acts]]'' in early 1941, which was followed by her final breakdown and suicide in the nearby River Ouse on 28 March.{{sfn|Todd|1999|p=13}}
=== Hogarth Press (1917–1938) ===▼
{{main|Hogarth Press}}▼
[[File:Shakespeare Plays hand bound by Virginia Woolf.JPG|thumb|Shelf of [[Shakespeare]] plays hand-bound by Virginia Woolf in her bedroom at [[Monk's House]]{{efn|It has been suggested that Woolf bound books to help cope with her depression, as is hinted at in her writing: "A great part of every day is not lived consciously. One walks, eats, sees things, deals with what has to be done; the broken vacuum cleaner; ... cooking dinner; bookbinding."{{sfn|Sim|2016}}{{page needed|date=July 2024}}}}]]▼
Virginia had taken up book-binding as a pastime in October 1901, at the age of 19.{{sfn|Bell|1972|loc=Chronology |p=192}}{{sfn|Heyes|2016}} The Woolfs had been discussing setting up a publishing house for some time{{snd}}Leonard intended for it to give Virginia a rest from the strain of writing, and therefore help her fragile mental health. Additionally, publishing her works under their own outfit would save her from the stress of submitting her work to an external company, which contributed to her breakdown during the process of publishing her first novel ''The Voyage Out''.{{efn|Her second novel, ''[[Night and Day (Woolf novel)|Night and Day]]'' (1919), was also published by Duckworth's, but ''[[Jacob's Room]]'' (1922) was published by Hogarth.{{sfn|Heyes|2016}}}} The Woolfs obtained their own hand-printing press in April 1917 and set it up on their dining room table at Hogarth House, thus beginning the [[Hogarth Press]].{{sfn|Heyes|2016}}{{sfn|Zakaria|2017}}▼
The first publication was ''Two Stories'' in July 1917, consisting of "The Mark on the Wall" by Virginia Woolf (which has been described as "Woolf's first foray into modernism"{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=67}}) and "Three Jews" by Leonard Woolf. The accompanying illustrations by [[Dora Carrington]] were a success, leading Virginia to remark that the press was "specially good at printing pictures, and we see that we must make a practice of always having pictures." The process took two and a half months with a production run of 150 copies.{{sfn|British Library|2018c}} Other short short stories followed, including ''[[Kew Gardens (short story)|Kew Gardens]]'' (1919) with a [[woodblock printing|woodblock]] by Vanessa Bell as [[book frontispiece|frontispiece]].{{sfn|Todd|1999|p=13}} Subsequently Bell added further illustrations, adorning each page of the text.{{sfn|British Library|2018d}}▼
Unlike its contemporary small printers, who specialised in expensive artisanal reprints, the Woolfs concentrated on living avant-garde authors,{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=63}} and over the subsequent five years printed works by a number of authors including [[Katherine Mansfield]], [[T.S. Eliot]], [[E. M. Forster]], Clive Bell and Roger Fry. They also produced translations of Russian works with [[S. S. Koteliansky]], and the first translation of the complete works of [[Sigmund Freud]].{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=68}}{{sfn|Heyes|2016}} They acquired a larger press in 1921 and began to sell directly to booksellers.{{sfn|Heyes|2016}} In 1938 Virginia sold her share of the company to [[John Lehmann]],{{sfn|Bell|1972|p=250}} who had started working for Hogarth Press seven years previously.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|p=590}} The Press eventually became Leonard's only source of income, but his association with it ended in 1946, after publishing 527 titles, and Hogarth is now an imprint of [[Penguin Random House]].{{sfn|Zakaria|2017}}{{sfn|Heyes|2016}}▼
The Press also produced explicitly political works. Pamphlets had fallen out of fashion due to the high production costs and low revenue, but the Hogarth Press produced several series on contemporary issues of international politics, challenging colonialism and critiquing Soviet Russia and Italian fascism.{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|pp=72,74}} The Woolfs also published political fiction, including ''Turbott Wolfe'' (1926) by [[William Plomer]] and ''In a Province'' (1934) by [[Laurens van der Post]], which concern South African racial policies and revolutionary movements respectively.{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=75}} Virginia Woolf saw a link between international politics and feminism, publishing a biography of Indian feminist activist [[Saroj Nalini Dutt]] and the memoirs of [[suffragette]] [[Elizabeth Robins]].{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=71}} Scholar Ursula McTaggart argues that the Hogarth Press shaped and represented Woolf's later concept of an "Outsiders' Society", a non-organised group of women who would resist "the patriarchal fascism of war and nationalism" by exerting influence through private actions, as described in ''Three Guineas''. In this view, the readers and authors form a loose network, with the Press providing the means to exchange ideas.{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|pp=63,65,66,70}}▼
=== Further works (1920{{ndash}}1940) ===
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The Woolf's final residence in London was at 37 [[Mecklenburgh Square]] (1939–1940), destroyed during [[the Blitz]] in September 1940; a month later their previous home on Tavistock Square was also destroyed. After that, they made Sussex their permanent home.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|pp=728-730,733}}
===
[[File:Handwriting-virginia-woolf-10921544-600-870.jpg|thumb|upright|Woolf's suicide letter to her husband]]▼
After completing the manuscript of her last novel (posthumously published), ''[[Between the Acts]]'' (1941), Woolf fell into a depression similar to one which she had earlier experienced. The onset of the Second World War, the destruction of her London home during [[the Blitz]], and the cool reception given to [[Roger Fry: A Biography|her biography]] of her late friend [[Roger Fry]] all worsened her condition until she was unable to work.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|pp=725,739}} When Leonard enlisted in the [[Home Guard (United Kingdom)|Home Guard]], Virginia disapproved. She held fast to her [[pacifism]] and criticised her husband for wearing what she considered to be "the silly uniform of the Home Guard".{{sfn|Gordon|1984|p=269}}▼
After the Second World War began, Woolf's diary indicates that she was obsessed with death, which figured more and more as her mood darkened.{{sfn|Gordon|1984|p=279}} On 28 March 1941, Woolf drowned herself by walking into the fast-flowing [[River Ouse, Sussex|River Ouse]] near her home, after placing a large stone in her pocket.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|pp=747-748}} Her body was not found until 18 April.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|p=752}} Her husband buried her cremated remains beneath an elm tree in the garden of [[Monk's House]], their home in [[Rodmell]], Sussex.{{sfn|Wilson|2016|p=825}}▼
In her suicide note, addressed to her husband, she wrote:▼
{{blockquote|Dearest,▼
I feel certain that I am going mad again. I feel we can't go through another of those terrible times. And I shan't recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can't concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don't think two people could have been happier till this terrible disease came. I can't fight it any longer. I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know. You see I can't even write this properly. I can't read. What I want to say is I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. I want to say that—everybody knows it. If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. I can't go on spoiling your life any longer. I don't think two people could have been happier than we have been. V.{{sfn|Jones|2013}}{{sfn|Rose|1979|p=243}} }}▼
▲{{main|Hogarth Press}}
▲[[File:Shakespeare Plays hand bound by Virginia Woolf.JPG|thumb|Shelf of [[Shakespeare]] plays hand-bound by Virginia Woolf in her bedroom at [[Monk's House]]{{efn|It has been suggested that Woolf bound books to help cope with her depression, as is hinted at in her writing: "A great part of every day is not lived consciously. One walks, eats, sees things, deals with what has to be done; the broken vacuum cleaner; ... cooking dinner; bookbinding."{{sfn|Sim|2016}}{{page needed|date=July 2024}}}}]]
▲Virginia had taken up book-binding as a pastime in October 1901, at the age of 19.{{sfn|Bell|1972|loc=Chronology |p=192}}{{sfn|Heyes|2016}} The Woolfs had been discussing setting up a publishing house for some time{{snd}}Leonard intended for it to give Virginia a rest from the strain of writing, and therefore help her fragile mental health. Additionally, publishing her works under their own outfit would save her from the stress of submitting her work to an external company, which contributed to her breakdown during the process of publishing her first novel ''The Voyage Out''.{{efn|Her second novel, ''[[Night and Day (Woolf novel)|Night and Day]]'' (1919), was also published by Duckworth's, but ''[[Jacob's Room]]'' (1922) was published by Hogarth.{{sfn|Heyes|2016}}}} The Woolfs obtained their own hand-printing press in April 1917 and set it up on their dining room table at Hogarth House, thus beginning the [[Hogarth Press]].{{sfn|Heyes|2016}}{{sfn|Zakaria|2017}}
▲The first publication was ''Two Stories'' in July 1917, consisting of "The Mark on the Wall" by Virginia Woolf (which has been described as "Woolf's first foray into modernism"{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=67}}) and "Three Jews" by Leonard Woolf. The accompanying illustrations by [[Dora Carrington]] were a success, leading Virginia to remark that the press was "specially good at printing pictures, and we see that we must make a practice of always having pictures." The process took two and a half months with a production run of 150 copies.{{sfn|British Library|2018c}} Other short short stories followed, including ''[[Kew Gardens (short story)|Kew Gardens]]'' (1919) with a [[woodblock printing|woodblock]] by Vanessa Bell as [[book frontispiece|frontispiece]].{{sfn|Todd|1999|p=13}} Subsequently Bell added further illustrations, adorning each page of the text.{{sfn|British Library|2018d}}
▲Unlike its contemporary small printers, who specialised in expensive artisanal reprints, the Woolfs concentrated on living avant-garde authors,{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=63}} and over the subsequent five years printed works by a number of authors including [[Katherine Mansfield]], [[T.S. Eliot]], [[E. M. Forster]], Clive Bell and Roger Fry. They also produced translations of Russian works with [[S. S. Koteliansky]], and the first translation of the complete works of [[Sigmund Freud]].{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=68}}{{sfn|Heyes|2016}} They acquired a larger press in 1921 and began to sell directly to booksellers.{{sfn|Heyes|2016}} In 1938 Virginia sold her share of the company to [[John Lehmann]],{{sfn|Bell|1972|p=250}} who had started working for Hogarth Press seven years previously.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|p=590}} The Press eventually became Leonard's only source of income, but his association with it ended in 1946, after publishing 527 titles, and Hogarth is now an imprint of [[Penguin Random House]].{{sfn|Zakaria|2017}}{{sfn|Heyes|2016}}
▲The Press also produced explicitly political works. Pamphlets had fallen out of fashion due to the high production costs and low revenue, but the Hogarth Press produced several series on contemporary issues of international politics, challenging colonialism and critiquing Soviet Russia and Italian fascism.{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|pp=72,74}} The Woolfs also published political fiction, including ''Turbott Wolfe'' (1926) by [[William Plomer]] and ''In a Province'' (1934) by [[Laurens van der Post]], which concern South African racial policies and revolutionary movements respectively.{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=75}} Virginia Woolf saw a link between international politics and feminism, publishing a biography of Indian feminist activist [[Saroj Nalini Dutt]] and the memoirs of [[suffragette]] [[Elizabeth Robins]].{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|p=71}} Scholar Ursula McTaggart argues that the Hogarth Press shaped and represented Woolf's later concept of an "Outsiders' Society", a non-organised group of women who would resist "the patriarchal fascism of war and nationalism" by exerting influence through private actions, as described in ''Three Guineas''. In this view, the readers and authors form a loose network, with the Press providing the means to exchange ideas.{{sfn|McTaggart|2010|pp=63,65,66,70}}
== Mental health ==
Much examination has been made of Woolf's mental health. From the age of 13, following the death of her mother, Woolf suffered periodic mood swings.{{sfn|Garnett|2011|p=114}} However, [[Hermione Lee]] asserts that Woolf was not "mad"; she was merely a woman who suffered from and struggled with illness for much of her life, a woman of "exceptional courage, intelligence and stoicism", who made the best use, and achieved the best understanding she could of that illness.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|p=171}}
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Thomas Caramagno{{sfn|Caramagno|1992}} and others,{{sfn|Koutsantoni|2012}} in discussing her illness, oppose the "neurotic-genius" way of looking at mental illness, where creativity and mental illness are conceptualised as linked rather than antithetical.{{sfn|Jamison|1996}}{{sfn|Caramagno|1992}} [[Stephen Trombley]] describes Woolf as having a confrontational relationship with her doctors, and possibly being a woman who is a "victim of male medicine", referring to the lack of understanding, particularly at the time, about mental illness.{{sfn|Trombley|1980}}{{page needed|date=June 2024}}{{sfn|Trombley|1981}}{{page needed|date=June 2024}}
▲[[File:Handwriting-virginia-woolf-10921544-600-870.jpg|thumb|upright|Woolf's suicide letter to her husband]]
▲After completing the manuscript of her last novel (posthumously published), ''[[Between the Acts]]'' (1941), Woolf fell into a depression similar to one which she had earlier experienced. The onset of the Second World War, the destruction of her London home during [[the Blitz]], and the cool reception given to [[Roger Fry: A Biography|her biography]] of her late friend [[Roger Fry]] all worsened her condition until she was unable to work.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|pp=725,739}} When Leonard enlisted in the [[Home Guard (United Kingdom)|Home Guard]], Virginia disapproved. She held fast to her [[pacifism]] and criticised her husband for wearing what she considered to be "the silly uniform of the Home Guard".{{sfn|Gordon|1984|p=269}}
▲After the Second World War began, Woolf's diary indicates that she was obsessed with death, which figured more and more as her mood darkened.{{sfn|Gordon|1984|p=279}} On 28 March 1941, Woolf drowned herself by walking into the fast-flowing [[River Ouse, Sussex|River Ouse]] near her home, after placing a large stone in her pocket.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|pp=747-748}} Her body was not found until 18 April.{{sfn|Lee|1997a|p=752}} Her husband buried her cremated remains beneath an elm tree in the garden of [[Monk's House]], their home in [[Rodmell]], Sussex.{{sfn|Wilson|2016|p=825}}
▲In her suicide note, addressed to her husband, she wrote:
▲{{blockquote|Dearest,
▲I feel certain that I am going mad again. I feel we can't go through another of those terrible times. And I shan't recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can't concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don't think two people could have been happier till this terrible disease came. I can't fight it any longer. I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know. You see I can't even write this properly. I can't read. What I want to say is I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. I want to say that—everybody knows it. If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. I can't go on spoiling your life any longer. I don't think two people could have been happier than we have been. V.{{sfn|Jones|2013}}{{sfn|Rose|1979|p=243}} }}
[[File:Roger Fry - Virginia Woolf.jpg|thumb|upright|A portrait of Woolf by [[Roger Fry]] {{circa|1917}}|alt= Portrait of Woolf in 1917 by Roger Fry]] [[File:StracheyWoolf.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Lytton Strachey]] and Woolf at [[Garsington Manor|Garsington]], 1923|alt=Lytton Strachey with Virginia Woolf 1923 ]]
[[File:Virginia Woolf 1927.jpg|thumb|upright|Virginia Woolf 1927|alt=Portrait of Virginia Woolf 1927]]
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