WOOLF, Virginia. The Voyage Out. (1915 - FIRST EDITION)

AUTHOR: WOOLF, Virginia.

TITLE: The Voyage Out.

PUBLISHER: London: Duckworth & Co., London, 1915.

DESCRIPTION: FIRST EDITION. 1 vol., 7-1/4" x 5", with the 16 pages of publisher’s advertisements, bound in full dark blue morocco, ribbed gilt decorated spine, gilt dentelles, covers ruled in gilt, all edges gilt, by The Chelsea Bindery.

CONDITION: Internally clean and bright, inner and outer hinges fine, no previous ownership markings or bookplate, A FINE COPY.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: This is Virginia Woolf’s first novel “The Voyage Out”. Woolf began work on The Voyage Out in 1910 but the novel had a long and difficult gestation and was not published until 1915. It was written during a period in which Woolf was especially psychologically vulnerable. She suffered from periods of depression and at one point attempted suicide. The resultant work contained the seeds of all that would blossom in her later work: the innovative narrative style, the focus on feminine consciousness, sexuality and death. Writing in 1926, E. M. Forster described it as "... a strange, tragic, inspired book whose scene is a South America not found on any map and reached by a boat which would not float on any sea, an America whose spiritual boundaries touch Xanadu and Atlantis". Reviewing the book a decade earlier, he wrote this: "It is absolutely unafraid... Here at last is a book which attains unity as surely as Wuthering Heights, though by a different path."