Virginia Woolf in Manhattan. Maggie Gee
step by step.
Step
by
step.
I was afraid. I kept walking, I drew abreast.
I was any fan, any groupie, suddenly. I could see her face. Her great globes of eyes, darting down, away: hunted.
Perhaps I should have left her. But how could I have let her stumble out on to the streets of Manhattan on her own?
I had to say: ‘Virginia?’
VIRGINIA
She said my name, that first time, as if I belonged to her. They shan’t have me! She said ‘Virginia?’ and I was off like a hare. There were red ropes, I went the wrong way, a man in uniform stopped me & asked to look at ‘those books’, I had two of my own & he looked at me hard and said ‘Ma’am, are these from the library?’ – but I said ‘No’ & rushed on, with her after me. And then –
ANGELA
Half of me was laughing, half of me was shivering, nothing like this had ever happened, not to me. But I couldn’t let her go.
It was brilliant; it was impossible; it was so thrilling I could hardly breathe. It was Virginia Woolf in Manhattan. And I reached out my hand.
VIRGINIA
She touched me. It felt – electric. You see, I wanted –
ANGELA
It was like dipping my hand in water.
VIRGINIA
I wanted to come back.
2
ANGELA
I loved my life: I was in the thick of it. Things I had earned by writing my books. Yes, I’ve earned them, and I enjoy them. Films, travel, clothes, chocolate. I loved my daughter – I love my daughter. (It seems a long time since I emailed her.)
I love good food, and taking out money, nice thick chunks of it out of the wall. And no, I don’t have to feel defensive. My parents were poor, and my mother couldn’t cook. I like the sunny side of the street, because when I was a child, days were darker. When I was a child I was often afraid. And of course, more recently, problems with Edward. Eco-heroes are hard to live with.
It was more a question of living without. Edward was on an expedition to the Arctic, financed by a cat’s cradle of grants. I hadn’t wanted him to go. There were a series of explosive rows before he went. I told him, if he was leaving me, he needn’t bother coming back.
I hadn’t expected to be alone. But who wants to be with the wrong person? I knew my life was about to get better.
And so I paused before pushing onward. A dark smudge on the event horizon. Something brief as a fin surfacing.
(Because reading Virginia Woolf isn’t simple. I love her, but parts of her make me shiver. And sometimes – yes – she creeps into my head, a pale bony version of the woman she was, and she’s pointing to places I’ve never been, tunnelling away from air and sunshine. Although of course she can be very funny.)
In that instant the universe split, and I was sucked into this particular story.
There she was, white, in front of me.
‘Virginia?’ I sighed, a second time.
3
VIRGINIA
A yellow-haired female was gaping at me. Not respectable. Primped & painted. Yet her demeanour was kind enough. All around us, more painted women. Everyone smelled of chemicals. There were many Africans and Chinamen.
Was it Wolstenholme’s laudanum? How had I lost myself again?
The world whirled round me, I had no centre, perhaps the voices would begin.
Yet part of me was still, quiet. A child, watching. Was I reborn?
ANGELA
Then, too late, I remembered my manners. We stood in the foyer of the library, the great loud streets roaring past outside, but there was still glass protecting her – I felt from the start I would have to protect her. ‘Mrs Woolf?’ I corrected myself. ‘Mrs Woolf? May I help you?’
‘I think,’ she said – such a beautiful voice, but absurd! If she tried to give a reading today, people would laugh out loud at her fluting vowels, her long ‘I’s like ‘A’s, her ‘a’s like ‘e’s – ‘I may perhaps need help. I seem to have forgotten where I am.’
And I stammered, ‘The New York Public Library.’
‘A library?’ Large eyes, grey-green, puzzled. Blurred or misted with age or doubt. Blinking out from caves of bone. ‘Perhaps there is a telephone?’
‘Use my mobile,’ I said. ‘But we must go outside.’
She stared, then continued as if I had not spoken. ‘Is there a telephone I might use?’
So many things to explain to her. But first I must get her to some kind of shelter. Virginia Woolf on these blaring streets … ‘Come back to my hotel. It’s not far.’
On the other hand: Woolf in my modern room – modern to her – small, slightly seedy, the radiator humming, my shabby 1970s Waddington Hotel?
Her voice became more imperious. ‘I’m so sorry, I don’t know your name, but I really must telephone my husband.’
And then I was overwhelmed with pity. She did not know that he was dead! But I said – that temptation to show my knowledge – ‘Leonard.’ There must have been something in my tone, for she looked back at me, alarmed. ‘Are you an acquaintance of my husband’s?’
‘I’ve heard of him. Everyone has.’
And her long, almost equine face relaxed. Those mournful, haunted eyes sparkled, her full lips lifted in a sweet, shy smile. Yes, a chalice of happiness. ‘Do you think so? Mr Woolf will be amused to know that.’
You love him still, I thought with pain, pain for her and then for me – Edward said he loved me, but he still walked out. Had I ever been loved as Virginia was?
‘You’ll have to come with me,’ I said, almost brusque (people were starting to stare at her). And then, as kindly as I could, ‘Come with me, I’ll look after you.’
And yes, that’s what I tried to do.
4
GERDA
My mum picked up this weird old woman. That’s what I thought till I googled her. For a bit, Mum thought about nothing else. She claimed this person was ‘very famous’. Mum didn’t bother to explain to me. I just thought, ‘Yeah, she’s got a loony in tow.’
She should have told me. I would have believed her. And in the end – but that’s much later.
5
ANGELA
Virginia smelled. Of mud, and roots. People were pausing and sniffing the air as they pressed through those great library doors. I wasn’t able to be objective. I thought, it’s a dream, of course it’s a dream, but please don’t make me wake up until –
I needed to learn what she had to teach me. Maybe everything. About life, and writing. She had the secrets. She’d reached the end. The hard truth people can never tell us. At least, that’s something I’ve always thought. Not till the end is the pattern complete. But then they slip away through the gate. They can’t come back, we can’t ask questions.
Yet here she was. Virginia.
VIRGINIA
Have I slipped my leash?
I