The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (7 page)

Virginia, with her novelist's instinct and curiosity, persuaded Jack to talk about his feelings for Stella, and his sexual desire and frustrations. ‘We were [mentally] “intimate” for years', she wrote, but she was not physically attracted to him.
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She liked him but his main interest for her lay in what he revealed of himself and men's sexual lives and, above all, because he had been Stella's husband.

Vanessa, on the other hand, who had regarded Stella more as a friend and sister rather than a mother, was physically drawn to Jack and he in turn to her. Virginia increasingly felt left out of the relationship and became jealous, suddenly afraid of losing her last remaining prop.

It was all very theatrical: three lonely unhappy people, seeking comfort from one another. The affair petered out but only after George had intervened to point out that it was illegal for in-laws to marry. To Virginia's short-lived delight, he asked her to persuade Vanessa to see sense. There was a scene between the sisters, which ended in Virginia asking for forgiveness, and mutual embraces.

As the only women in a household of demanding men, Virginia and Vanessa drew together and closed ranks, forming, in Virginia's words, ‘a close conspiracy'.
13
Vanessa became responsible for the household affairs from 1897 to Leslie's death in 1904. Virginia called this time ‘the seven unhappy years', but they were valuable years for her. She read prodigiously, guided by her father. She studied Latin and Greek. She kept a journal and experimented with differing styles of writing, composed essays and wrote some perceptive sketches of people. She discovered a love of music and went to concerts, and began to make friends and to move tentatively outside the family circle.

Minor cyclothymic swings had begun around the age of 17 but she was, for most of this time, comparatively stable and well. Her weight was steady, menstruation regular and there were no panic attacks or outbursts of unreasonable temper.
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Life was mostly a dull, undemanding routine, without undue stress.

The unhappiness of these seven years came from conflicting feelings towards her father. He was, she thought, a split personality: the good, literary, humane man she adored and the bullying, brutal, egocentric tyrant she hated. Her ambivalence was not of course new, but it became magnified through his cavalier treatment of Vanessa.

Every Wednesday after lunch, Vanessa presented the household accounts for her father's inspection. After a moment's silence he invariably accused her of extravagance and became heated and abusive: ‘I am ruined. Have you no pity for me? There you stand like a block of stone…'
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He would roar and hammer on the table but Vanessa never responded. She stood mute, looking into the distance until at last, with a heavy sigh, Leslie signed the cheque and she immediately left the room.

Virginia was outraged by the brutality of these scenes, feeling ‘unbounded contempt' for her father ‘and pity for Vanessa'.
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His melodramatic behaviour was reserved entirely for women. Virginia was certain her father would have restrained himself had a man been present. He looked on his womenfolk as part saint, part slave, there to satisfy his infantile needs. Julia and Stella had stuck to the rules of his game but Vanessa refused to play. When Stella died he assumed Vanessa would put on the mantle of the Angel in the House and he was astonished and upset to discover he was wrong, unable to adapt his ways. Angry though these scenes made her, Virginia did not follow Vanessa from the room. She sat on in silence hoping perhaps for some sign from her father that might redeem him in her eyes. After a time he would abandon his self-pity and look at Virginia and say, half contritely, ‘You must think me … foolish.'
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Leslie treated Virginia more like a man potentially his equal than one of his women. She was like him in many ways, and she was easily his favourite child, the one destined to become a writer, to follow the Stephen tradition.

Virginia had immense admiration for the good literary father, his honesty and unworldliness and sincerity, and she criticised her mother for not having checked his unpleasant egocentric side. But like her, she believed the
DNB
to have been responsible for much of his later deterioration. The loved and hated father continued to obsess her long after his death, and she argued and raged against him and told him what she had dared not say to him in life.

She craved Leslie's love and respect, but that could only come, she believed, through literary success. She never argued with him in life or challenged his opinion, even to herself. An unenthusiastic comment from him about her work would have been a terrible rejection and she never showed him any of her writing. The idea for her first novel,
The Voyage Out,
came to her at Manorbier in South Wales, after Leslie's death. Some years later, while writing the first draft, she had a dream where she showed him the manuscript and ‘he snorted, and dropped it on the table, and I was very melancholy'.
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Recalling him when she was famous, Virginia confessed that had he lived on to be 100, she could not have become a writer: ‘no writing, no books'.
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Any criticism from him would have destroyed her.

It was a truth that her husband Leonard came to understand intuitively. He always read the manuscript of each novel and Virginia waited on tenterhooks until he pronounced it to be ‘Your best'. Only then was Virginia's mind put at rest. It mattered not that she thought, ‘Has he not
got
to think so?' The approving words were crucial.

Virginia and Vanessa had few secrets from one another during those seven years. Each industriously pursued her own interest. Vanessa went to Cope's School of Art three days a week until 1901, when she entered the Painting School of the Royal Academy. Virginia had lessons in Greek twice a week, and read widely and developed her descriptive powers. They supported each other, confided, ridiculed and laughed about the family and friends, especially their half-brother George who was forever wanting to turn them into elegant young ladies. Vanessa alone at that time gave Virginia the warmth and care she needed, and encouraged her fantasies and sense of the absurd. Their nicknames from nursery days lived on: Virginia, Billy (goat); the
singes,
the Apes; Vanessa, the Dolphin.

Virginia listened sympathetically when Vanessa railed against their father but there were times when she would have liked to talk of his good side, his understanding and sensibility, but Vanessa gave her no opportunity. Any suggestion that Leslie had good qualities would be met by sulky silence and a wall of rejection, which Virginia had to avoid at all cost.

*   *   *

Leslie became ill in 1902 with cancer of the bowel. He continued to work and summer holiday with his children until his death, but the old fiery spirit was gone. During this time the twenty-year-old Virginia desperately needed a sympathetic ear, to unburden herself of guilt and love, to speak of the agony of losing her father. Vanessa could not help. It was then that Virginia found what she most needed: a maternal ‘aunt'.

Violet Dickinson was 37, a tall, gawky spinster, well read, musical, cultivated, with a natural charm. She had been a close friend of Stella's and Virginia had always liked her, although previously she had not known her well. Perhaps Violet Dickinson recognised Virginia's plight and made a deliberate effort to be sympathetic. Whatever it was, Virginia responded and threw herself, literally and metaphorically, into Violet's arms. Violet reciprocated. Virginia's mind had always interested her and she was prepared to mother her and meet her emotional demands.

Virginia discussed every detail of her father's terminal illness with Violet and brought out her anxieties and admiration: ‘He is such an attractive creature, and we get on so well when we're alone.'
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She clung to Violet gratefully: ‘You are the only sympathetic person in the world. That's why everyone comes to you with their troubles.'
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Within a short time Violet had come, together with Leslie, to occupy the centre of her thoughts. She wove childish fantasies of herself and Violet. Violet was a kangaroo whose pouch was a ‘haven for small kangaroos'. Virginia became ‘Sparroy', derived from Sparrow and Monkey. It is noteworthy that, with Vanessa, Violet, Leonard, and Vita, Virginia became in make-believe some species of monkey. In childhood Virginia had enjoyed visiting the London Zoo, watching the small monkeys cling to their mothers, perhaps identifying with them.

The pleasure of embracing Violet Dickinson aroused ‘hot volcanic depths' in Virginia.
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‘I wish no more. My food is affection.'
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Some of her letters to Violet, like those to Vanessa, read like love letters but it is wrong to see the relationship in terms of adult sexuality. Virginia craved intimate mother-love, not the erotic.

Violet Dickinson must have been both surprised and gratified by Virginia's passion; she was not alarmed and continued to provide the affection Virginia needed. Whether or not she had a lesbian side is entirely conjectural and rather beside the point. Virginia was neither looking nor ready for such a relationship.

Inevitably there were moments when Virginia's emotional demands became too much, and Violet told her so. Virginia was only momentarily nonplussed: ‘a blessed hell-cat and an angel in one', she declared, using her father's imagery.
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But Virginia was by no means always all child in the relationship. She liked Violet as a person, and took a close interest in Violet's life, talked over her difficulties, discussed books and the theatre and acquaintances in common. But it was as a mother-figure that she was most important to Virginia, and when this role ended so did their intimacy.

*   *   *

Leslie died on 22 February 1904. After the funeral the Stephens, with George Duckworth, went to Manorbier on the Pembrokeshire coast, which was not unlike St Ives, for a month. Virginia felt the loss acutely. She dreamt of her father and could not accept he was dead. She was tormented; she should have done more for him, told him of her devotion, demonstrated her love.

The group walked along the cliffs, and went on ‘queer little expeditions' organised by George ‘to help pass the time'.
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Virginia clung to her family, for, when they were all together, Leslie, and Julia as well, seemed near. Outwardly they all got on but Virginia felt increasingly cut off and isolated. She could not speak to any of them about her grief. Thoby was too reserved, while Adrian, who had disliked and feared his father, was far from unhappy at his death. Vanessa, too, felt released and was enthusiastically organising everyone, planning to leave Hyde Park Gate and its past and take up new lives. It was, Virginia told Violet Dickinson, hard to listen and speak to them about her father: ‘You can't think what a relief it is to have someone – that is you, because there isn't anyone else to talk to.'
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Virginia's depression was not incapacitating and there were days when she came alive and no longer felt ‘like a cow with her nose in the grass'. She read and wrote, and one day, ‘walking the down on the edge of the sea', suddenly saw the outline of the novel she wanted to write.
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It was like a brilliant flash of light, illuminating the gloom and, with hindsight, perhaps a sign of lurking trouble, for Leslie's death had coincided with springtime cyclothymic depression.

Virginia's resentment was building up against Vanessa. Her sister's dismissal of Leslie, her wish to forget their past, her gaiety and plans for the future upset her. She minded leaving Hyde Park Gate with all its associations and memories. She wanted everything preserved, and she kept thinking she would find Leslie at home on her return. Her sense of loss was becoming overwhelming: ‘I wonder how we go on as we do, as merry as grigs all day long,' she complained.
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Virginia's resentment was increased by Vanessa's scolding for picking at food or going to bed too late, but at the same time she desperately wanted her sister's affection; not even Violet Dickinson could replace her for long as mother-substitute.

From South Wales the Stephens travelled to Italy, reaching Venice on Easter Sunday. Virginia, who had not been further than Boulogne before, was excited and her spirits momentarily rose. Venice seemed an amusing and beautiful place, and she liked the people. But the respite was short-lived. Depression returned and she began to feel trapped and anxious, ‘like a Bird in a Cage'.
29
They moved to Florence, where they were joined by Violet Dickinson. Virginia had been looking forward to the reunion, but her spirits failed to lift. She behaved badly, was dull and ‘tempersome', and the atmosphere grew increasingly uneasy.

Virginia angrily watched Vanessa enjoying herself, exploring churches and palaces and enthusing over frescoes and pictures. Her resentment bubbled over in outbursts of temper. More alarmingly, towards the end of their stay in Florence, signs of paranoia began to appear:

Germans are brutes – there is a strange race that haunts hotels – gnome-like women who are creatures that come out in the dark. An hotel is a sort of black cave.
30

Black humour perhaps, but it was inappropriate. Virginia was trapped in her own black cave. Travelling back to England they spent a few days in Paris, and joined a ‘real Bohemian café party', which included Clive Bell and the painter Gerald Kelly, where they talked of ‘Art, sculpture and music until 11.30'.
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Vanessa was in her element. Virginia was over-stimulated and pushed one step nearer the abyss.

Virginia became manic two days after she returned home; wildly excited, three nurses were needed to control her. Anger against Vanessa poured out in torrents of abuse and violence, and her sister was forced to withdraw. Violet Dickinson came to the rescue and Virginia was taken from Hyde Park Gate to Violet's country home, Welwyn, at Burnham Wood.