Violet Trefusis

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Standard Name: Trefusis, Violet
Birth Name: Violet Keppel
Married Name: Violet Trefusis
Though VT is best known to literary history as a lover of English writer and aristocrat Vita Sackville-West , she wrote and published in a range of genres throughout her life, which spanned much of the twentieth century. These include diaries and letters, novels, memoirs, travel journalism, and radio broadcasting, composed in both English and French.
Title-page of "Poems and Tales", 1808, volume ii, by Elizabeth Trefusis, published with her name as "Miss Trefusis".
Head-and-shoulders portrait sketch of Violet Trefusis by William Bruce Ellis Ranken, 1919. Against a purple background, she looks straight at the viewer, wearing light purple dress and bright red lipstick. Her hair is chin-length, curly, and brown.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Cultural formation Marina Warner
In England, MW had a comfortable middle-class upbringing. Her godfather was crime reformer Lord Longford (father of historian and novelist Antonia Fraser ). A writer, Violet Trefusis , was her godmother and another novelist, Lawrence Durrell
death Colette
She was given a state funeral on 11 August, the first Frenchwoman to be accorded this honour. A somewhat inaccurate obituary in the Times drew responses from both Violet Trefusis and Margaret Crosland . Trefusis...
Dedications Vita Sackville-West
She dedicated it to Violet Trefusis , using the initial L., short for the nickname Lushka.
Education Vita Sackville-West
At thirteen VSW began attending a small day school run by Helen Wolff (whose name is variously spelled in various sources) in South Audley Street, off Park Lane. The staff were mostly male. Vita...
Education Nancy Cunard
After NC 's mother left her husband and moved to London, Nancy became a regular pupil at Miss Wolff 's School in South Audley Street, where she had previously attended some classes.
The surname...
Education Iris Tree
Sometime after 1904, IT and her next elder sister, Felicity, began attending Miss Wolff 's day school, an unconventional school held at the private home of Miss Wolff at South Audley Street, London. There...
Family and Intimate relationships Vita Sackville-West
VSW began her sexual affair with Violet Keppel (later Violet Trefusis), who had been an erotic force in her life since her schooldays.
Glendinning, Victoria. Vita. Penguin, 1984.
23, 91
Nicolson, Nigel, and Vita Sackville-West. Portrait of a Marriage. Futura, 1974.
143
Family and Intimate relationships Vita Sackville-West
VSW and Violet Keppel (later Violet Trefusis ) spent the winter together in France (at Paris and Avignon) and at Monte Carlo.
Glendinning, Victoria. Vita. Penguin, 1984.
98-9
Nicolson, Nigel, and Vita Sackville-West. Portrait of a Marriage. Futura, 1974.
143
Family and Intimate relationships Vita Sackville-West
VSW and the now married Violet Trefusiseloped to France, where they had previously enjoyed the freedom to enact the roles which went with their love-affair.
Glendinning, Victoria. Vita. Penguin, 1984.
108
Nicolson, Nigel, and Vita Sackville-West. Portrait of a Marriage. Futura, 1974.
143
Family and Intimate relationships Vita Sackville-West
During her relationship with Vita, Rosamund was fiercely jealous of Violet Keppel , later Trefusis. Vita had rejoiced, when she met Violet at a party in London, at having a real friend.
Glendinning, Victoria. Vita. Penguin, 1984.
23
Violet...
Friends, Associates Edith Sitwell
ES had many friendships, and there were few notables in the artistic world whom she did not meet. Her friendships were quite volatile, with frequent quarrels, sometimes caused by the practical jokes and the heightened...
Friends, Associates Rosita Forbes
An indefatigable name-dropper, RF wrote that the greatest, and most sensible, man she had ever met was Kemal Atatürk ; she then bracketed with him Franklin Delano Roosevelt .
Forbes, Rosita. Gypsy in the Sun. Cassell, 1944.
55-6
In Cairo she was always...
Friends, Associates Rosita Forbes
In FinlandRF met the national hero Marshal Mannerheim .
Forbes, Rosita. Gypsy in the Sun. Cassell, 1944.
302
On her first visit to the USA she met Rebecca West , Ruth Draper , Anna Pavlova , and H. G. Wells ; on...
Friends, Associates Marie Belloc Lowndes
She continued to enjoy socialising. She was entertained by Ann Bridge in Portugal and by Violet Trefusis in Somerset.
Lowndes, Marie Belloc. Diaries and Letters of Marie Belloc Lowndes, 1911-1947. Editor Marques, Susan Lowndes, Chatto and Windus, 1971.
268, 273
Friends, Associates Rebecca West
RW again met Violet Trefusis in Florence (whom she had known slightly in England), and they became lifelong friends.
Rollyson, Carl. Rebecca West: A Saga of the Century. Hodder and Stoughton, 1995.
56-7
Trefusis, Violet, and Philippe Jullian. Don’t Look Round. Hutchinson, 1953.
71-2

Timeline

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Texts

Trefusis, Violet, and Victoria Glendinning. Broderie Anglaise. Translator Bray, Barbara, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1985.
Trefusis, Violet, and Philippe Jullian. Don’t Look Round. Hutchinson, 1952.
Trefusis, Violet, and Philippe Jullian. Don’t Look Round. Hutchinson, 1953.
Trefusis, Violet. Écho. Plon, 1931.
Trefusis, Violet, and Philippe Jullian. From Dusk to Dawn. Tom Stacey, 1972.
Trefusis, Violet. Hunt the Slipper. W. Heinemann, 1937.
Trefusis, Violet, and Lorna Sage. Hunt the Slipper. Virago, 1983.
Sage, Lorna, and Violet Trefusis. “Introduction”. Hunt the Slipper, Virago, 1983, p. v - xiv.
Glendinning, Victoria, and Violet Trefusis. “Introduction”. Broderie Anglaise, translated by. Barbara Bray and Barbara Bray, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1985.
Trefusis, Violet. “Introduction”. Violet to Vita, edited by Mitchell A. Leaska, Methuen, 1989, pp. 1-52.
St Aubin de Terán, Lisa, and Violet Trefusis. “Introduction”. Pirates at Play, Virago, 1996, p. vii - xiii.
Trefusis, Violet. Les Causes Perdues. Gallimard, 1941.
Jullian, Philippe, and Philippe Jullian. Memoirs of an Armchair. Translator Trefusis, Violet, Hutchinson, 1960.
Trefusis, Violet. Pirates at Play. Joseph, 1950.
Trefusis, Violet, and Lisa St Aubin de Terán. Pirates at Play. Virago, 1996.
Trefusis, Violet. Prelude to Misadventure. Hutchinson, 1941.
Trefusis, Violet. Sortie de secours. Éditions Argo, 1929.
Trefusis, Violet. Tandem. W. Heinemann, 1933.
Jullian, Philippe et al. The Other Woman. Houghton Mifflin, 1976.
Trefusis, Violet. Violet to Vita. Editors Leaska, Mitchell A. and John Nova Phillips, Methuen, 1989.
Jullian, Philippe et al. Violet Trefusis: Life and Letters. Hamish Hamilton, 1976.