"Opposite Ends of the Bloody Stick": Virginia Woolf and Hugh Walpole, Intersections of the Highbrow and Middlebrow

Abstract:Through correspondence and conversations, Virginia Woolf and Hugh Walpole developed a friendship in 1928 that lasted until their deaths. Although contemporaneously perceived as opposed to one another, as representatives of highbrow and middlebrow writing, they discussed fictional practice extensively, culminating in a dialogue between their Hogarth Letters (1932), published on the same day. Intertextual allusions to Woolf and her novels—especially To the Lighthouse (1927), Orlando (1928), and the proofs set of The Waves (1931)—in Walpole's works attest to their creatively stimulating relationship. This analysis of their overlooked friendship reveals extensive intersections between highbrow and middlebrow literary networks and the individual writers' works.