Orlando (Warbler Classics Annotated Edition)

by Virginia Woolf, Ulrich Baer (Afterword)

Overview

Virginia Woolf's 1928 novel Orlando is her most entertaining and exciting book. The mock biography recounts the life of a sixteenth-century nobleman who ends up as a woman writer in 1920s England. Over the centuries Orlando lives through the gamut of human experience as both a man and a woman. It is an irreverent send-up of dutifully rendered biographies of great men, a tongue-in-cheek commentary on some formal innovations in Woolf's novels, and a carefully masked portrait of Vita Sackville-West, the real-life aristocrat who swept into Woolf's life and heart. Woolf's exuberance in realizing that a faux biography afforded her an entirely new inventive freedom animates this frolicsome gallop across four centuries.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781962572330
Publisher:	Warbler Classics
Publication date:	01/01/2024
Pages:	246
Product dimensions:	5.25(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.56(d)

About the Author

VIRGINIA WOOLF (1882-1941), an English writer, is considered one of the most important modernist authors of all time. Her novels include Jacob's Room, Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse, Orlando, and The Waves. Until her death by suicide in 1941, she was at the center of The Bloomsbury Group in London, a circle of immensely influential writers, artists, and intellectuals who created new paradigms for life during a time of great cultural, economic, and political upheaval.

ULRICH BAER is University Professor at New York University, a graduate of Harvard and Yale, and the recipient of Guggenheim, Getty, and Humboldt fellowships. He has written new introductions to many classic works of world literature and published widely on poetry, fiction, and photography.

Date of Birth:

January 25, 1882

Date of Death:

March 28, 1941

Place of Birth:

London

Place of Death:

Sussex, England

Education:

Home schooling

Editorial Reviews

Juliet Stevenson brings her usual alacrity to this challenging audiobook. Woolf's unconventional novel is in expert hands with Stevenson, whose rich voice and lilting accent keep the listener on track through the many shifts and changes in the plot. Called a "biography" by Woolf herself, the story follows protagonist Orlando through centuries of change, including Orlando's transformation from a man to a woman. Stevenson is an elegant narrator who navigates the details gracefully. Her pace is consistent, and her emotional investment helps the plot along. The novel itself relies heavily on description, and the sheer mass of detail can become fatiguing to the ear. Devoted listeners might find the audio format perfect, but even Stevenson's fine performance may not be able to capture the casual listener. L.B.F. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine

APRIL 2024 - AudioFile