Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Radclyffe Hall
-
Standard Name: Hall, Radclyffe
Birth Name: Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall
Nickname: John
Self-constructed Name: Radclyffe Hall
RH
is best-known today for her landmark lesbian novel The Well of Loneliness, 1928. But she herself explained that she waited until she had made a name for myself as an author . . . because I felt that it would . . . be difficult for an unknown writer to get a novel on congenital sexual inversion published.
Hall, Radclyffe. Radclyffe Hall’s 1934 Letter About The Well of Loneliness. Lesbian Herstory Educational Foundation, 1994.
1-2
Her literary reputation was based first on her poetry but later, and more substantially, on her novels, particularly Adam's Breed.
Lesbianism had been the subject of novels in the 1920s and 30s. Virginia Woolf
's Mrs. Dalloway and Elizabeth Bowen
's The Hotel had both been criticised (the latter severely) for sympathetic treatments of emotional...
Textual Features
Naomi Mitchison
Her format here has stories or groups of stories introduced and ended with a poem. Topics range from ancient to contemporary, from sexuality to politics. The first poem has Phaedra
telling her sister Ariadne
about...
Reception
Lili Elbe
Although the negative criticism that LE
received before publishing her book had largely been overcome through her first newspaper publication, there was still some lingering suggestion of scandal surrounding her book when it appeared. It...
Publishing
Naomi Mitchison
She had finished this book, and her publisher had read it by 1933. She argued for months over its acceptability with her usual publishers, Jonathan Cape
(who had been fined for publishing Radclyffe Hall
's...
Publishing
Una Troubridge
During her involvement with the Society for Psychical Research
, from about 1916 to 1921, a number of UT
's papers appeared in the Proceedings, some of which she co-wrote with Radclyffe Hall
.
Troubridge, Una. The Life and Death of Radclyffe Hall. Hammond, Hammond, 1961.
57
Publishing
Una Troubridge
Gallimard
published Léo Lack
's and UT
's French translation of Radclyffe Hall
's novel The Well of Loneliness, as Le puits de solitude.
Ormrod, Richard. Una Troubridge: The Friend of Radclyffe Hall. Carroll and Graf, 1985.
205
Cline, Sally. Radclyffe Hall: A Woman Called John. John Murray, 1997.
Twentieth-century translator and biographer UT
is best remembered for her numerous translations from the French and Italian, and for her biography of her lover of twenty-eight years, the writer Radclyffe Hall
. UT
also published...
politics
Amabel Williams-Ellis
A tea-party at the London studio of architect Clough Williams-Ellis
(probably hosted by him and his wife AWE
) was held to discuss possible legal support of Radclyffe Hall
's The Well of Loneliness.
Woolf, Virginia. The Letters of Virginia Woolf. Editors Nicolson, Nigel and Joanne Trautmann, Hogarth Press, 1975–1980, 6 vols.
VSW
disliked the term feminist, though many of her socially nonconforming attitudes would attract that term today. She supported the fight for Radclyffe Hall
's Well of Loneliness. She did not involve herself...
politics
E. M. Forster
After 1924, EMF
turned from writing novels to social and political causes, in particular the issue of freedom of expression. In 1928 he campaigned against the suppression of Radclyffe Hall
's The Well of Loneliness...
politics
Mary Renault
MR
appreciated Compton Mackenzie
's Extraordinary Women, which dealt openly with lesbians and evaded the censor because it treated lesbianism as comic. She referred to it in a review as a masterpiece of gentle...
politics
Virginia Woolf
The New Censorship, a letter to the editor protesting against the suppression of Radclyffe Hall'sThe Well of Loneliness and signed by VW
and E. M. Forster
, appeared in the Nation.
Bishop, Edward. A Virginia Woolf Chronology. Macmillan, 1989.
115
politics
Virginia Woolf
During the trial of Radclyffe Hall
's novel The Well of Loneliness, VW
attended with many friends and associates in order to give evidence, but the magistrate refused to hear testimony on literary merit.
Bishop, Edward. A Virginia Woolf Chronology. Macmillan, 1989.
117
Other Life Event
Una Troubridge
The obscenity trial of Radclyffe Hall
's novel The Well of Loneliness began on 9 November 1928, when Hall's publisher received a summons. It and culminated on 16 November, when the novel was declared obscene...
