Interview

Norah Vincent discusses her first novel Adeline in which she explores the life of Virginia Woolf. Among the many topics discussed Vincent explains how in many ways this novel is a work of immersion journalism, like her two previous nonfiction works.

What was it about Virginia Woolf that compelled you to start writing Adeline?

I thought about writing this book about three years ago. At that time, I bought Hermione Lee's biography and read it. I bought and reread VW's major novels and her diaries. I had bought and read all five volumes of Leonard Woolf's autobiography ten years before, so I already had that in my mind and on the bookshelf.

But after doing all of this I found that the specter of VW was just too much for me. I thought what any normal person would think: Are you nuts? You can't write about VW, much less as her. Forget it.

So I did forget it, sort of, and I shelved the idea. But then, after going through a pretty awful depression in 2013, I came back to VW, for obvious reasons, I think. I really identified with her struggle with mental illness and creative self-confidence. Also, I had just gotten married, so I realized that I wanted to write a book about marriage.

I've always felt that Leonard Woolf has been poorly represented/poorly remembered by history, and that VW has in a sense been too revered. He was a much kinder person I think than most people know, and she could be quite nasty personally, and often was. In writing about them I wanted...