This is a 1927 BBC radio-staged drama/interview of Virginia Woolf’s father conducted by the inimitable Miss Q. R. Ramsbottom.
[The deceased noted editor and critic Mr. Leslie Stephen is admirably recreated by the aging and rebellious actor Leland T. Bondfaig.]
--Good morning Mr. Stephen, thank you for agreeing to participate in our program.
[So starts the seemingly benign interview of a man who unwittingly provided numerous nasty personality character flaws permanently imbedded in the main male character of Virginia Woolf’s recently self-published novel, To the Lighthouse. Mr. Stephen had arrived at the sound studio the morning of March 20, 1927 determined to set the record straight, to defend his honour, and to challenge his daughter Virginia’s recollection of fact and family life in the Stephen household. Soliciting sympathy was a daily occurrence for Mr. Stephen; and everyone knew how difficult single parenting was especially with a most difficult awkward young girl who adored her Mother—may she rest in peace. His plan was to prove conclusively that he was a misunderstood but able Father, not the feared manipulative strict authority figure his daughter had delivered to the world—and all for the sake of her idea of art.]
--You must be very proud of Virginia, her book has taken London by storm, and everyone is proclaiming her style and technique to be uniquely different and innovative in a novelist’s approach to writing; they predict Lighthouse will become a classic in the world of Literature. Her novel actually reads like poetry, don’t you think?
--I don’t know about that—she certainly didn’t follow any style of any book she found in my library. I always encouraged her to spend time reading literary masters in the hope that she might learn from them.
--Oh Mr. Stephen, I think she has. Her use of language is melodic and passionate as it is complicated and colourfully dense—I think you’ll agree, I’d like to read a passage if I may?
--Which one?
--The dinner party starting section 17.
--Fine, go ahead, I’ll be listening carefully for the density.
[The lovely and talented spinsterly-looking Mrs. Ramsbottom had been a mainstay in the BBC’s Literary Department. She loved her work, especially when the requirement to read aloud—her passion and delight—would have her voice fall on all of England’s ears. She cleared her throat, adjusted her skirt, loosened her already loose tie, and took a small sip of clear liquid from her glass and began to read ever so slowly, verifying and creating the soft flowing introspective dynamic shaped by Virginia Woolf’s syntax.]
--“But what have I done with my life? thought Mrs. Ramsay, taking her place at the head of the table, and looking at all the plates making white circles on it. ‘William, sit by me,’ she said. ‘Lily,’ she said wearily, ‘over there.’ They had that—Paul Rayley and Minto Doyle—she, only this—an infinitely long table and plates and knives. At the far end, was her husband, sitting down, all in a heap, frowning. What at? She did not know. She did not mind. She could not understand how she had ever felt any emotion or any affection for him. She had a sense of being pas…”(Woolf 89.8)
--Now stop right there, Virginia is dead wrong about her dead Mother and, in this book even me! How could she feel and say those things putting unkind words in her Mother’s mouth? Mrs. Ramsay, I mean Mrs. Stephen and I had a wonderful marriage and she adored me, and I took care of her as a gentleman must a lady.
[Mrs. Ramsbottom was visibly shaken by Mr. Stephen’s outburst and reached for another sip of liquid. Two more required coughs from Mrs. Ramsbottom followed by her soft lilting but now determined voice.]
