STUART N. CLARKE (ed.). The Essays of Virginia Woolf, vol 5.

Abstract

When Andrew McNeillie surrendered the last two volumes of The Essays of Virginia Woolf, I was apprehensive. He brought a unique level of knowledge and experience to the project. He assisted Anne Olivier Bell in her magisterial edition of The Diary of Virginia Woolf (five volumes) and produced fine editions of the Common Reader, First and Second Series. While his understanding of the intellectual and culture history of the period and of the life and work of Virginia Woolf is encyclopaedic, he wears his scholarship lightly, directing our attention always to the work with an apparatus that encourages us to read the essays without distraction before exploring references and connections. His remarkable work heightened our understanding and appreciation of one of the most compelling voices in Twentieth Century letters, and I was loath to trust another. Who else could work at this height and keep his footing? It was wasted worry. Stuart N. Clarke's edition of volume five of The Essays of Virginia Woolf continues Andrew's high level of scholarship and editorial care. Volume Five follows the principles established by McNeillie in the first four and, by increasing attention to textual details, adds depth and resonance. As with the earlier volumes, the fifth allows readers to read the essays without an intrusive apparatus that values the editor's knowledge and skill over the text. While this is the first rule of textual editing, it is often ignored. Thanks to McNeillie and Clarke, Virginia Woolf has been spared the fate of others, Joyce and Conrad most especially, whose work has often been asked to bear the weight of an editorial apparatus that suffocates the text, leaving the author and the reader short of breath.