Bloomsbury Group in LGBT history
The Bloomsbury Group plays a prominent role in the LGBT history of its day. The Bloomsbury Group was a collective of early 20th-century writers that produced some of the most important and prominent writers of all time.[1] Some of the writers made great strides in LGBT representation, depiction, and rights decades before it was socially acceptable to do so.[1] Named after the Bloomsbury area in London where they lived and worked between 1905 and the 1930s, some of the core members were Virginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell, E.M Forster, Roger Fry, and Lytton Strachey.[2]
Before the First World War
In 1905, a group of artists, writers, and intellectuals began to meet weekly at 46 Gordon Square in Bloomsbury, London.[3] This was home to the Stephen siblings, including painter Vanessa Bell (1879-1961) and the writer Virginia Woolf (1882-1941). They were joined by other important figures such as critic Roger Fry (1866-1934) and artist Duncan Grant (1885-1978).[3] Over the next 30 years, they exchanged ideas and discussed their work, collectively earning the Bloomsbury Group name.
While still in the Bloomsbury area, LGBT activity was conducted in single groups. For example, Duncan Grant, a homosexual with bisexual leanings,[4] had affairs with Maynard Keynes, James Strachey, Adrian Stephen, David Garnett, and Vanessa Bell. Names of LGBT people outside the Bloomsbury Group include Mary Garman, Nina Hamnett, Jane Ellen Harrison, Rupert Brooke, and Arthur Hobhouse. D. H. Lawrence criticized the homosexual tendencies close to the core members of the group[5] Today, they are renowned for their relationships, which were considered unconventional by society at the time, but are now celebrated as part of LGBTQ+ history.
During and after the First World War
Later, the groups differentiated. Keynes married Lydia Lopokova, and gradually ceased having affairs with men. Other groups split according to the location where they started to live. Most LGBT men in and around the Bloomsbury Group were conscientious objectors during the war. They had to leave London in order to do manual labour on the land.
Lady Ottoline Morrell's circle
Lady Ottoline Morrell's extravagant parties no longer brought the group together. During the First World War, she provided housing for conscientious objector Aldous Huxley at Garsington Manor, where he was married to Maria Nys after the war. D. H. Lawrence, another visitor to Garsington, befriended Huxley.
Charleston
Duncan Grant and David Garnett worked on the land as conscientious objectors during World War I. They lived with Vanessa Bell in Charleston Farmhouse. Francis Birrell started a bookshop together with David Garnett later on.
Lytton Strachey and Dora Carrington
During the First World War, Lytton Strachey and Dora Carrington moved to Tidmarsh Mill House. Later (in a ménage à trois with Ralph Partridge), they moved to Ham Spray House. Roger Senhouse was Strachey's last lover
E. M. Forster
E. M. Forster spent his time as a conscientious objector in Egypt, remaining there some time after the First World War. When returning to England, his circle of LGBT friends and acquaintances included W. J. H. Sprott, J. R. Ackerley, Christopher Isherwood, Siegfried Sassoon, Forrest Reid, and Benjamin Britten.
Virginia Woolf
Virginia and Leonard Woolf first moved to Hogarth House in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, where they set up the Hogarth Press. Later, they moved to Monk's House in East Sussex.
Hogarth Press
Katherine Mansfield and John Lehmann were LGBT acquaintances linked to Hogarth Press, the publishing company Virginia Woolf owned with her husband Leonard Woolf.
Orlando
After Virginia Woolf moved to Monk's House, she met Vita Sackville-West, writing her Roman à clef Orlando: A Biography , about her. Woolf met the LGBT people around her, including Harold Nicolson, Sackville-West's husband, Benedict Nicolson, their LGBT son, and Violet Trefusis, her former lover.[6]
Other
Composer and suffragist Ethel Smyth was another acquaintance of Virginia Woolf.[7]
References
- ^ a b Gray, Sarah (5 June 2023). "The Bloomsbury Group and Pride Month: Connections, Advocacy, and Progress". Canterbury Classics. Retrieved 17 March 2026.
- ^ "The Bloomsbury Group: where were they in 1921? | Blog". www.findmypast.co.uk. Retrieved 17 March 2026.
- ^ a b "Queer Connections: The Bloomsbury Group - National Portrait Gallery". www.npg.org.uk. Retrieved 17 March 2026.
- ^ Angelica Garnett, Deceived with Kindness (1984) p. 33 (in 1995 edition)
- ^ Francis Spalding, Duncan Grant: A Biography. (1997) p. 169-170: (around 1915 Lawrence warned David Garnett against homosexual tendencies like those of Francis Birrell, Duncan Grant and Keynes:) "Lawrence's views, as Quentin Bell was the first to suggest and S. P. Rosenbaum has argued conclusively, were stirred by a dread of his own homosexual susceptibilities, which are revealed in his writings, notably the cancelled prologue to Women in Love"
- ^ Souhami, pp. 123-124
- ^ Spalding 1991
Bibliography
- Todd Avery. Radio Modernism: Literature, Ethics, and the BBC, 1922-1938. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.; 1 January 2006. ISBN 978-0-7546-5517-6.
- Peter Clarke. Keynes. Bloomsbury Press, 2009. pp. 56, 57. ISBN 978-1-60819-023-2.
- Angelica Garnett. Deceived with Kindness (1984)
- Hermione Lee, Virginia Woolf London: Chatto & Windus, 1996.
- Ian Ousby ed., The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English (Cambridge 1995)
- Souhami, Diana (1997). Mrs. Keppel and Her Daughter. Portrait of a Lesbian Affair: St. Martin's Griffin. pp. 123–223. ISBN 978-0-312-19517-5.
denys trefusis and violet trefusis.
- Frances Spalding. Virginia Woolf: Paper Darts: the Illustrated Letters (1991)