Beyond the Letters

Biographies are generally a non-fiction genre, for even though they have some place for imagination and emotionality within them, they are mostly a collection of facts presented in an attractive way. But many writers, especially modern ones, try to reconsider this quite old genre and give a new life to it. Here I will tell you about some novels that depict images of famous people, and whose main aim is not to tell the story of someone’s life but to let the reader see these personalities through the author’s eyes. 1. Miss Charity by Marie-Aude Muriel Loosely based on the life of Beatrix Potter this little comedy however managed to create a very credible image of the acclaimed children author. Beatrix Potter was a talented writer with her own unique vision of the world and her own ideas about woman’s position in society. Living in highly conventional Victorian society, she dared to state that any woman could be more than just a wife or a housekeeper. The book is written in th...

Virginia Woolf is very difficult to write about.  She was an innovator of her time and like many modernists was very decisive in breaking all connections with the traditional form of a novel. Therefore unusual plot structure, stream of consciousness technique and excessive expressionism that are only several unconventional features of “Jacob’s room”. After an outrage of emotion, which any book of Virginia is, one longs for something more rational and systematic so I decided to present this review in several key points. The form “The march that the mind keeps beneath the windows of others is queer enough. Now distracted by brown panelling; now by a fern in a pot; here improvising a few phrases to dance with the barrel-organ; again snatching a detached gaiety from a drunken man; then altogether absorbed by words the poor shout across the street at each other (so outright, so lusty)—yet all the while having for centre, for magnet, a young man alone in his room.” Stream o...