PLEASE NOTE: Online events appear in purple type.
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Society events (members only)
Online events
Recordings
The VWSGB holds regular live online events, which are recorded and loaded to the Society’s YouTube channel. Members can access recordings to May 2022 using the password supplied to them. (From July 2022 only ticket holders have access to the event recording.)
Recordings of online events to May 2022
Email onlinevwsgb@gmail.com for further information and queries.
Bloomsbury in Love
Wednesday 19 February 2025, 5.30pm
Member readings celebrating the subject of love and friendship, to celebrate Valentine’s Day. FREE for members, who will receive details of how to join the session.
Vanessa Bell: Life and Art
Wednesday 19 March 2025, 5.30pm
Illustrated talk by Sarah Latham Phillips about Woolf’s sister, friend and collaborator. Members will receive details of how to join the session.
Tickets £5
WoolfNotes
Wednesday 14 May 2025, 5.30pm
Illustrated talk by Michèle Barrett about this exciting new Woolf resource. Members will receive details of how to join the session.
Tickets £5
Email membershipvwsgb@gmail.com to join the Society, or onlinevwsgb@gmail.com for further information and queries about online events.
Virginia Woolf and Bloomsbury Reading Group
We are pleased to offer this reading group FREE for VWSGB members who want to talk about the works of Virginia Woolf and some of her Bloomsbury friends and contemporaries, to find connections, influences and similarities between them. The meetings will be a mixture of online and face-to-face discussions. Come prepared to tell us about your experience of reading the work, whether it’s your first or your hundredth time! What themes or motifs did you notice? Did anything surprise, delight, perplex or anger you? What do you think are the best parts, and why?
Email membershipvwsgb@gmail.com to join the Society, or onlinevwsgb@gmail.com for further information and queries about the Reading Group.
The Common Reader
Friday 7 February 2025, 5.30pm
The following essays from The Common Reader First Series by Virginia Woolf (1925):
The Lives of the Obscure
Jane Austen
Modern Fiction
Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights
George Eliot
The Russian Point of View
Outlines: Miss Mitford, Dr Bentley
Lady Dorothy Nevill, Archbishop Thomson
The Patron and the Crocus
The Modern Essay
Joseph Conrad
How It Strikes a Contemporary
Society events open to non-members
DallowayDay: The Centenary
Saturday 21 June 2025
Hatchards, 187 Piccadilly, London W1J 9LE
We hope to have a guided Bloomsbury walk in the morning, followed by speakers at Hatchards, Piccadilly starting at 2pm. Professor Mark Hussey will talk about his new book, Mrs Dalloway: A Biography. Other speakers and further information to be announced. Wine and nibbles included. Members will receive priority booking details and discounts on ticket prices.
Other events
Woolf and Politics (Literature Cambridge)
Monthly to June 2025, 6–8pm British time
Join us for unique seasons of live online lectures and seminars on the major works of Virginia Woolf.
Saturday 8 February 2025. Natasha Periyan on Education in The Years (1936)
Saturday 8 March 2025. Trudi Tate on Mrs Dalloway (1925) and the Vote
Saturday 12 April 2025. Varsha Panjwani on The Politics of Orlando (1928)
Saturday 10 May 2025. Angela Harris on The Politics of Jacob’s Room (1922)
Saturday 14 June 2025. Claire Davison on Body Politics and Clothing in Three Guineas (1938)
Fees: £32 per session (£27 VWSGB members and other concessions)
Vanessa Bell: A World of Form and Colour
Saturday 19 October 2024–Sunday 23 February 2025
MK Gallery, 900 Midsummer Boulevard, Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire MK9 3QA
Vanessa Bell (née Stephen; 1879–1961) was a key figure in twentieth-century British art and played a central role in the Bloomsbury group. This exhibition at MK Gallery – the largest-ever solo show of Bell’s work – will provide an overview spanning the artist’s illustrious career, from the Friday Club to Omega Workshops. The exhibition will include all aspects of her practice across fine and applied art. Alongside a significant, carefully selected display of over 70 paintings will be drawings, furniture, ceramics and designs; in all, more than 120 items. Vanessa Bell: A World of Form and Colour is organised by MK Gallery in partnership with Charleston. The exhibition is generously supported by the Jerwood Foundation.
Standard ticket price: £11.50 (book online)
Note: This exhibition transfers to Lewes late March 2025; see below.
Dora Carrington: Beyond Bloomsbury
Saturday 9 November 2024–Sunday 27 April 2025
Pallant House Gallery, 8–9 North Pallant, Chichester, West Sussex PO19 1TJ
This will be the first museum exhibition of works by Dora Carrington (1893–1932) in almost 30 years. The Barbican Art Gallery held the last major exhibition of her work in 1995 and in the same year Emma Thompson starred as the free-spirited painter in the film Carrington. Co-curated by Anne Chisholm, editor of Carrington’s Letters (2017), and writer and critic Ariane Bankes, the exhibition will reveal the continued relevance of Carrington’s unconventional life and remarkable work.
As a significant contributor to Modern British art during the interwar years and an associate of the Bloomsbury Group, Carrington was described as ‘the most neglected serious painter of her time’ by former Tate Director Sir John Rothenstein. This exhibition aims to reposition Carrington in the history of Modern British art. Spanning paintings, drawings and prints from across her career, the exhibition will include film and photographs from private and public collections. It will form a powerful portrait of Carrington, exploring her defiance of gender norms and her circle of eminent friends. Taken together, her artworks, many made for her friends, capture a Bohemian way of life: loving, creative, domestic and intimate.
Tickets £12.50 (must be purchased in advance): see the website
Vanessa Bell: Portraits by Duncan Grant
Saturday 16 November 2024–Sunday 23 February 2025
Charleston, Firle, Lewes, East Sussex BN8 6LL
Open Wednesday–Sunday/Bank Holiday Monday, 10am–5pm
To coincide with Vanessa Bell: A World of Form and Colour at MK Gallery, we’re displaying ten significant portraits of Vanessa Bell by her close friend and fellow artist Duncan Grant inside the house at Charleston in Firle. These rarely seen works, loaned from private collections and newly discovered in our archives, will be shown alongside our world-leading collection of paintings, furniture and objects. Admission is included with the purchase of a house ticket.
For more about Charleston, see below.
A Room of One’s Own (performance)
Friday 14 February 2025, 7.30pm
Jedburgh Town Hall, Abbey Place, Jedburgh TD8 6BE, Scotland
Firebrand Theatre Company with Live Borders Arts & Creativity and Duns PlayFest presents A Room of One’s Own, adapted from the writings of Virginia Woolf, directed by the award-winning Richard Baron and featuring Ellie Zeegen, who says: ‘It is an honour to be playing a new stage version of Virginia Woolf: the woman, the female activist and one of the most influential writers of the 20th century.’ Following a recent sell-out autumn tour, Firebrand, in association with Live Borders and Duns Play Fest, makes its debut at Jedburgh Town Hall.
Tickets £8 from the Live Borders website
For more information, contact Jason Moyes at Live Borders on 07971 091 870.
Vanessa Bell: A World of Form and Colour
26 March–30 September 2025, Wednesday–Sunday/Bank Holiday Monday, 10am–5pm
Charleston in Lewes, Southover Road, Lewes, East Sussex BN7 1FB
Vanessa Bell (née Stephen; 1879–1961) was a key figure in twentieth-century British art and played a central role in the Bloomsbury group. This exhibition – the largest-ever solo show of Bell’s work – will provide an overview spanning the artist’s illustrious career, from the Friday Club to Omega Workshops. The exhibition will include all aspects of her practice across fine and applied art. Alongside a significant, carefully selected display of over 70 paintings will be drawings, furniture, ceramics and designs; in all, more than 120 items. Vanessa Bell: A World of Form and Colour is organised by Charleston in partnership with MK Gallery.
See the website for further information and for ticket prices.
Virginia Woolf and Our Future: Mrs Dalloway’s Centennial and Beyond – Call for Papers
6th Japan–Korea International Virginia Woolf Conference
Saturday 23 August 2025 (CFP 31 March 2025)
Tsuru Humanities Center (THMC), Tsuru University, 3-8-1 Tahara, Tsuru, Yamanashi, Japan
Jointly organised by the Virginia Woolf Society of Japan and the Virginia Woolf Society of Korea. The aim of the conference is to think about our future by reappraising the works of Virginia Woolf. Professor Max Saunders, Interdisciplinary Professor of Modern Literature and Culture at the University of Birmingham, will give a lecture on ‘The Future and the Novel in the 1920s’.
Conference language is English. Oral presentations will be twenty minutes and the question period ten minutes. Possible topics may include, but are not limited to:
• modernism
• war, violence and peace
• life writing
• narratives around care and age
• anthropocene and environment
• technology and networking
• biopolitics and bioethics
• literature, visual arts, music and other forms of art
Submissions: please send the title of your paper, an abstract of 250 words and a five-line biography, plus contact details, to the conference organising committee at jk.vwoolf.conference@gmail.com by 31 March 2025. Non-members may apply for presentations and participations if they have a referral from a member of either society.
For more information, download pdf from the VWSJ website.
Woolf and Dissidence: 34th Annual Virginia Woolf Conference
Friday 4 July 2025, King’s College London
Pre-conference event: visit to the King’s Archives and a panel discussion on ‘Virginia Woolf: Creative Engagements’ with contemporary writers and artists speaking about their multimedia engagements with Woolf’s writing. Speakers include Jo Hamya, Olivia Laing and Kabe Wilson.
Saturday 5–Tuesday 8 July 2025, University of Sussex, UK
On 5 July keynote speakers will be Professor Madelyn Detloff and Professor Anne Fernald. An exciting programme of events is planned, including a performance of Between the Acts, events to mark the centenary of Mrs Dalloway, a conversation with Kim Jones and Charlie Porter, and a house tour and banquet at Charleston. There will also be a post-conference visit to Monks House, as well as the option of trips to local exhibitions.
In the centenary year of the publication of Mrs Dalloway it is fitting that the 34th Annual Virginia Woolf Conference returns to the UK and to two locations with strong Woolfian connections: King’s College London, where Woolf studied as a teenager, and Sussex, home to Monks House and Charleston. Our theme also honours the history of the Centre for the Study of Sexual Dissidence, founded by Alan Sinfield and Jonathan Dollimore, at the University of Sussex. The Centre’s pioneering work in sexuality and queer studies provides a fitting context for the Woolf conference.
Organised by Helen Tyson (University of Sussex), with Clara Jones and Anna Snaith (King’s College London). See the conference website for further information.
36th Annual Virginia Woolf Conference
Thursday 17–Sunday 20 June 2027 (pre-conference events Wednesday 16 June).
Oslo National Academy of the Arts
Organised by Ane Thon Knutsen. Further details to follow.
Virginia Woolf: Writing Life (Literature Cambridge)
Thursday 10–Monday 14 July 2025
This is the online version of the summer course with Literature Cambridge, consisting of five days (c.3.5 hours per day) of intensive study with lectures, tutorials, talks, discussions and more. Set reading: Mrs Dalloway (1925); To the Lighthouse (1927); Orlando (1928); The Waves (1931); Flush (1933); selected essays on biography. The course can accommodate participants in different time zones through a mixture of live online and pre-recorded material. To get a sense of how it works, please see the blog posts on Literature Cambridge’s website.
Course fees
£590 Full price
£550 VWSGB members
£550 CAMcard holders
£540 Students on a low income
For further information and to book, see the website or email info@literaturecambridge.co.uk
Virginia Woolf: Writing Life (Literature Cambridge)
Sunday 20–Friday 25 July 2025
Clare Hall, Herschel Road, Cambridge CB3 9AL (for classes)
Residence: Robinson College, Cambridge, or residence of your own choosing
This is the in-person version of the summer course with Literature Cambridge, consisting of five days of intensive study in Cambridge, with lectures, tutorials, talks, visits and more. Arrive in Cambridge Sunday afternoon 20 July; depart Saturday morning 26 July 2025. Set reading: Mrs Dalloway (1925); To the Lighthouse (1927); Orlando (1928); The Waves (1931); Flush (1933); selected essays on biography.
Course fees
£1,300 Full price
£1,200 VWSGB members
£1,200 CAMcard holders
£1,150 Students on a low income
For further information and to book, see the website or email info@literaturecambridge.co.uk
Monks House
Rodmell, Lewes, East Sussex BN7 3HF
Monks House is closed until March 2025, after which visits must be pre-booked (includes National Trust members).
Explore the country retreat of the novelist Virginia Woolf, where she wrote many of most celebrated novels. Leonard and Virginia’s personalities saturate the house and it should feel as if they have just stepped out for a walk. You can explore the house at your own speed and there are room guides on hand to help you to bring the house alive. The beautiful English country garden was designed by Leonard Woolf and has incredible views of the Sussex Downs. Virginia Woolf was greatly influenced by the garden wrote many of her major works in her writing lodge. Her short story ‘The Orchard’ was inspired by the garden. With the tranquility of the Sussex Downs through the window and the garden surrounding her, it was the perfect place to write.
Facilities
There is a small shop selling guidebooks, postcards and some second-hand books. Outdoor privy located in the garden. Dogs are permitted in the garden on a lead, but there are no dog bins at the property. There is a small parking area for cars and bicycles nearby, and the Abergavenny Arms in Rodmell serves tea, coffee and cake when Monks House is open.
Tickets £9.50/£10.50 adult, £4.75/£5.30 child (National Trust members free), on sale every Thursday for bookings for the following four weeks.
For more information, see the Monks House website
Volunteer guides
Would you like to be a volunteer guide at Monks House? Meet other Woolf enthusiasts and work, surrounded by Bloomsbury treasures, in the house where Virginia and Leonard Woolf lived for so many years. Training will be provided. Read more about volunteering for us. If you’re interested, please phone 01273 474760 or email monkshouse@nationaltrust.org.uk
Charleston
Charleston, Firle, Lewes, East Sussex BN8 6LL
Open Wednesday–Sunday/Bank Holiday Monday, 10am–5pm
Visit Charleston to explore the art and lives of artists Vanessa Bell, Duncan Grant and their contemporaries. Almost as soon as they moved to Charleston in 1916, Bell and Grant began to paint. Not just the walls, but on every surface imaginable, transforming the house into a living, breathing work of art. Over the following decades, Charleston became a gathering point for some of the twentieth century’s most radical artists, writers and thinkers known collectively as the Bloomsbury group. It is where they lived out their progressive social and artistic ideals. Today, it continues to be a place that brings people together to engage with art and ideas.
A visitor assistant will accompany you around the house as you explore the individually designed and hand-painted rooms. Entry to the galleries and the house is by timed ticket and pre-booking is recommended. The shop, café and garden are available to visit without purchasing a ticket. To book, see the website and for events, see the What’s On page. You can shop online at the Charleston shop web page.
Tickets £22.50 (concessions available; Friends of Charleston free)
Promoting your event
We would be happy to feature your Virginia Woolf event on this page and on social media (Facebook, X/Twitter, Instagram): please email the following to onlinevwsgb@gmail.com.
For website
Title of event
Day / date / time
Full address & postcode
Brief description
Ticket price and how to book
Contact email / phone no.
Web address for more info
–Events are listed in date order and will be deleted when expired, so please make sure all the relevant details appear for each event separately.
For Facebook, as above, plus at least one image. For X/Twitter, please provide a short post no longer than 280 characters (including spaces), and for Instagram, a 100-word paragraph plus image. Please make sure that these include the date of your event and contact details.
Payment (VWSGB events only)
First, book your place at the event by emailing eventsvwsgb@gmail.com
Next, pay for the event by online banking, PayPal, credit/debit card or cheque (sterling only).
1) For online payments, please use the following details.
Bank: Santander
Account Name: Virginia Woolf Society GB
Account No.: 40411044
Sort Code: 09 06 66
2) If you wish to pay by PayPal, please email for details. You may need to add a little extra to cover costs.
3) If you wish to pay by credit/debit card, you can email for a PayPal invoice. You will then be able to pay by Visa/Visa Debit/Visa Electron, Mastercard, Discover, UnionPay, Maestro or American Express.
4) Make out a cheque to ‘Virginia Woolf Society’ and email for details.
Reference: for all payment types, please indicate the event plus your surname (e.g. AGM22 SMITH), so that we can match up the payment with the contact details provided.