Vita Sackville-West
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Vita Sackville-West (March 9, 1892 – June 2, 1962) was an English writer and landscape gardener. She helped plan her own gardens in Sissinghurst, Kent which provide the backdrop to Sissinghurst Castle.
She was born Vita (Latin for life) Victoria Mary Sackville West at Knole House in Kent, the daughter of Lionel, the 3rd Lord Sackville and Victoria Sackville-West. In 1913, she married Harold Nicolson, a diplomat, journalist, broadcaster, member of Parliament and author of biographies and novels.
Her long narrative poem, The Land, won the Hawthornden prize in 1927.
Both Vita and her husband had several consecutive same-sex relations outside their marriage. The affair that had the deepest and most lasting effect on Vita's personal life, was that with Violet Trefusis. By the time both Vita's sons were out of nappies, Vita and Violet had "eloped" several times (from 1918 on, mostly to France, where Vita would dress as a young man when they went out). Vita wrote an autobiographical account about this period, which was later published by her son Nigel Nicolson as Portrait of a Marriage (note that this title was given by Nigel, and that he had to perform some heavy explaining in order to divert the attention that it was in fact the portrait of a extra-marital affair). Vita's novel Challenge also bears witness of this affair: Vita and Violet had started writing this book as a collaborative endeavour.
Another affair was with Virginia Woolf in the late 1920s. As a part of this affair, Woolf wrote Orlando about Vita, which Nigel Nicholson called "the longest and most charming love-letter in literature".
All these affairs (which are not fully listed here) were however no impediment for a true closeness between Vita and her husband, which appears from their nearly daily correspondence (also published later by their son Nigel), and from an interview they gave for BBC radio after the 2nd World War.
Sissinghurst Castle is now owned by the National Trust. Sissinghurst Castle Garden is the most visited garden in England.
Poetry
Novels
- Heritage (1919)
- Challenge (1923)
- The Edwardians (1930)
- All Passion Spent (1931)
- The Dark Island (1934)
Biographies/Other works
External Links=
- Complete List of Vita Sackville-Wests Publications (http://users.library.fullerton.edu/scox/vitaswbib.htm)de:Vita Sackville-West
et:Vita Sackville-West it:Vita Sackville-West nl:Vita Sackville-West