Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Sylvia Townsend Warner
-
Standard Name: Warner, Sylvia Townsend
Birth Name: Sylvia Nora Townsend Warner
STW
once commented that her career in writing was an accidental one, as her initial career was in musicology. However, she was very prolific for more than fifty years of the twentieth century over a considerable range of genres, including poetry, fourteen volumes of short stories, journal articles, radio plays, seven novels, biographies, and translations. Her letters and diaries have been published as well. Her fiction often explores supernatural themes and the twists of human psychology. She has been particularly praised for her short stories about middle-class characters, mainly women: for acute observation, clarity, precision, simplicity, and originality of language and of imagery.
In 1937, Ackland and Warner
moved to Lower Frome Vauchurch on the river Frome, near Maiden Newton, where they lived for the rest of their lives.
Mulford, Wendy. This Narrow Place. Pandora.
40-3
Early in the Second World War, from...
Family and Intimate relationships
Valentine Ackland
VA
and Sylvia Townsend Warner
committed themselves to each other in a lesbian marriage.
Harman, Claire. Sylvia Townsend Warner: A Biography. Chatto and Windus.
111
Family and Intimate relationships
Valentine Ackland
The three women had done political work together during the Spanish Civil War. VA
's relationship with Sylvia Townsend Warner
became increasingly strained as a result of this affair with White, which continued for more...
Residence
Valentine Ackland
VA
and Sylvia Townsend Warner
lived in Miss Green's cottage at Chaldon Herring.
Mulford, Wendy. This Narrow Place. Pandora.
35
Family and Intimate relationships
Valentine Ackland
Sylvia Townsend Warner
, who had originally bought the house, wished not to pressure VA
, but to allow her the freedom to choose whom she preferred as a partner. She moved out to live...
Family and Intimate relationships
Valentine Ackland
VA
began an intimate relationship with Elizabeth Wade White
, a young American friend of both Ackland and Sylvia Townsend Warner
.
Harman, Claire. Sylvia Townsend Warner: A Biography. Chatto and Windus.
Their postwar holidays included trips to Italy in February 1949, and to...
Family and Intimate relationships
Valentine Ackland
VA
lived with her lover, Elizabeth Wade White
, in the same house that Ackland had shared with Sylvia Townsend Warner
for many years at Lower Frome Vauchurch.
Mulford, Wendy. This Narrow Place. Pandora.
173
Harman, Claire. Sylvia Townsend Warner: A Biography. Chatto and Windus.
228-9, 234
Cultural formation
Valentine Ackland
The issues of religion and politics caused great unhappiness between Ackland and her lifelong partner, Sylvia Townsend Warner
, almost destroying their relationship. Ackland became increasingly right-wing, and their political views diverged sharply.
Mulford, Wendy. This Narrow Place. Pandora.
234-5
politics
Valentine Ackland
VA
and Warner
joined the Communist Party
, believing, like many of their contemporaries, that Communism offered the best or only defence against encroaching Fascism.
Mulford, Wendy. This Narrow Place. Pandora.
55
Warner, Sylvia Townsend. “Introduction”. Letters: Sylvia Townsend Warner, edited by William Maxwell, Chatto and Windus, p. vii - xvii.
xiv
Textual Production
Valentine Ackland
From the mid-1930s until the mid-1940s, Ackland published many of her early poems in the New Republic, New Masses, and The New Yorker. At that time Edmund Wilson
, among others, appreciated...
Occupation
Valentine Ackland
VA
opened an antique shop in Lower Frome Vauchurch, where she lived with Sylvia Townsend Warner
.
Mulford, Wendy. This Narrow Place. Pandora.
234
Literary Setting
Valentine Ackland
The book extended ideas covered in her articles for the Left Review.
Warner, Sylvia Townsend, and Valentine Ackland. I’ll Stand By You: Selected Letters of Sylvia Townsend Warner and Valentine Ackland. Editor Pinney, Susanna, Pimlico.
141n1
The text's downtrodden family was based on tenants living at East Chaldon with Ackland and Sylvia Townsend Warner
. Ackland added...
politics
Valentine Ackland
VA
voted Liberal (against Harold Wilson
's Labour government) in the general election, a departure from socialism which pained Warner
considerably.
Mulford, Wendy. This Narrow Place. Pandora.
235
Textual Production
Valentine Ackland
VA
experienced a spiritual crisis of total despair on 8 October 1947, and decided, at that moment, to stop drinking. This event was the beginning point for her autobiography. Warner
, privy to Ackland's diaries...
Timeline
No timeline events available.
Texts
Warner, Sylvia Townsend. Rainbow. Alfred Knopf, 1932.
Warner, Sylvia Townsend. Scenes of Childhood, and Other Stories. Chatto and Windus, 1981.
Warner, Sylvia Townsend. Sketches From Nature. Clare, Son and Company, 1963.
Warner, Sylvia Townsend. Some World Far From Ours; and, ’Stay, Corydon, Thou Swain’. E. Mathews and Marrot, 1929.
Warner, Sylvia Townsend. Somerset. Paul Elek, 1949.
Warner, Sylvia Townsend. Summer Will Show. Chatto and Windus, 1936.
Warner, Sylvia Townsend, and David Garnett. Sylvia and David: The Townsend Warner / Garnett Letters. Editor Garnett, Richard, Sinclair-Stevenson, 1994.