Literary Gossip Girl

Elizabeth Barret Browning: an addict?

2009-10-05T20:30:00.001-07:00

The Mrs. Browning of popular imagination was a sweet, innocent young woman who suffered endless cruelties at the hands of a tyrannical papa but who nonetheless had the good fortune to fall in love with a dashing and handsome poet named Robert Browning. She finally escaped the dungeon of Wimpole Street, eloped to Italy, and lived happily ever after.”[9] This was according to Wikipedia.com.
Still according to Wikipedia, there are insinuations that Ms. Barrett also developed an addiction to opium and morphine. Ms. Barrett allegedly developed the addiction to cope with the pain of her previous back injury. This rendered Ms. Barrett to be a recluse and an invalid.

Writers who were alcoholics

2009-09-24T01:23:00.000-07:00

According to a Time magazine article, out of the six Americans awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, four were alcoholics (Eugene O'Neill, Sinclair Lewis, William Faukner and Ernest Hemingway) and the a fifth, (John Steinbeck) drank heavily.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,904358,00.html Here is the Time magzaine article.

Virginia Woolf: A lesbian?

2009-09-22T19:10:00.000-07:00

Yes, it is true. According to her letters, she had a sexual relationship with Vita Sackville-West. In fact, one of Woolf's work, Orlando was based on Vita. A play, Vita and Virginia is largely based on the correspondence between the two.

http://www.frugalfun.com/vita.html In FrugalFun. com, a review of the play, Vita and Virginia is provided. Here are some excerpts from the review:

Shortly after she and Vita Sackville-West began their lesbian affair, Virginia Woolf wrote in her diary, “She shines with a candle-lit radiance, pink glowing, grape clustered, pearl hung.”

Those delicious images marked a sensual awakening for the author, a kind of feeling rarely shared by Edwardian husbands and wives. “These Sapphists,” Woolf marveled, “love women. Friendship is never untinged with amorosity.”

So began the on-again, off-again physical relationship that laced the two women’s nearly 20-year friendship, from the early 1920s until 1941, when Woolf committed suicide. They wrote to each other frequently, because they saw each other comparatively rarely. They traveled in different social circles, lived much of the time in different countries (Sackville-West’s husband was a diplomat in the British Foreign Service), and both were married—happily married—to men who were more or less willing to overlook their wives’ extramarital adventures.

Their letters, with some diary entries and other writings, were compiled into a compelling play by the English actress Eileen Atkins. The cleverly arranged excerpts form a conversation that covers not only Vita and Virginia’s personal interactions but much of their literary biography too. Indeed, much of the relationship is revealed in the women’s responses to reading each other’s books. They were both well-known writers—Sackville-West, not Woolf, the more commercially successful of the two.

Vita uses the same terms—”dazzled and bewitched”—to express her admiration for Woolf’s novels To the Lighthouse and Orlando. The latter, which has been called “the longest and most charming love letter in literature,” is a pseudo-biography whose title character—a man who doesn’t age but instead morphs into a woman—is a fantasy of Vita. (When Vita reads it she tells Virginia, “You have invented a new form of narcissism ... I confess, I am in love with Orlando.)

Looks like lesbo love happens among English novelists.. well, it was pretty rad and common among the Bloombury group to which Virginia and Vita belonged. So the term "open marriage" started way back... Sapphists... lesbos... in literature... xoxo

Martin Amis: A slimy womanizer?

2009-09-22T00:52:00.000-07:00

Martin Amis is a short story writer famous for his work, Money. http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/news/a-lover-to-rival-lord-byron-amiss-exgirlfriend-tells-all-1694521.html According to The Independent, Amis has have dalliances worth mentioning: Julie Kavanaugh,half-sister of the great literary giant, Pat Kavanaugh and Emma Soames, a granddaughter of the former prime minister Winston Churchill.

Well, well, nothing new here: writers like Hemingway, Merwin and Lord Byron are well-known womanizers, let's just add Martin Amis to the list. xoxo Lit gossip girl xoxo

F. Scott Fitzgerald: A plagiarist?

2009-09-22T00:37:00.000-07:00

F. Scott Fitzgerald is a short story writer famous for celebrating the Jazz Age during the 1920s. He is best known for his work on the Great Gatsby.

His muse, flapper girl personified, Zelda Sayre-Fitzgerald was quoted to have said : "i]t seems to me that on one page I recognized a portion of an old diary of mine which mysteriously disappeared shortly after my marriage, and also scraps of letters which, though considerably edited, sound to me vaguely familiar. In fact, Mr. Fitzgerald—I believe that is how he spells his name—seems to believe that plagiarism begins at home" (Zelda Fitzgerald: The Collected Writings, 388. This is taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._Scott_Fitzgerald.

Be wary of becoming of would writers asking you to lend them your diaries, they might end up "plagiarizing" your life! xoxo lit gossip girl xoxo

Luigi Pirandello's Suffered An Insane Wife

2009-09-22T00:21:00.000-07:00

Luigi Pirandello is a short story writer, novelist and dramatist who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1934. Pirandello is best known for his work on the Six Characters in Search of an Author.

Despite his fame and fortune, Pirandello had to suffer an insane wife, Antoinetta Portulano. It is said she went into a state of shock following the collapse of the family fortune during the sulphur industry's decline in 1903.

It is also said that Pirandello's life became difficult when his wife's insanity become violent. This is according to the website http://www.bestofsicily.com/mag/art199.htm. Pirandello had no choice but to commit his wife to an asylum. This is according to http://gradstudentmadness.blogspot.com/2007/10/theatrical-reality-of-pirandello.html. Pirandello also entertained thoughts on suicide but continued to stay strong for his wife. Many literary observers say that Pirandello's themes on madness and suicide is largely influenced with his having an insane wife.

Madness can be an inspiring muse in Luigi Pirandello's case. xoxo literary gossip girl xoxo