The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing

The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing

Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in Vita Sackville-West’s life, with the publication of a new biography by Matthew Dennison (Behind the Mask, 2014), about thirty years after Victoria Glendinning’s authoritative one, Vita (1983). Her love life and her skills as a gardener have been e...

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In:URI:https://journals.openedition.org/erea,
Main Author: REYNIER, Christine
Format: Article ou chapitre numérique
Language:Anglais
Published: E-rea 2020
Subjects:
modernism
history
women
invisibility
The Women’s Land Army
propaganda
histoire
modernisme
femmes
invisibilité
propagande
Online Access:Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM
Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM
id openedition-oai:revues.org:erea_9721
record_format openedition
spelling openedition-oai:revues.org:erea_9721 https://doi.org/10.4000/erea.9721 urn:doi:10.4000/erea.9721 en https://journals.openedition.org/erea/9721 2020-06-15T02:00:00Z info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess article info:eu-repo/semantics/article urn:handle:20.500.13089/fvh6 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing E-rea Laboratoire d’Études et de Recherche sur le Monde Anglophone info:eu-repo/semantics/reference/issn/1638-1718 URI:https://journals.openedition.org/erea REYNIER, Christine modernism history women invisibility The Women’s Land Army propaganda histoire modernisme femmes invisibilité The Women’s Land Army propagande Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in Vita Sackville-West’s life, with the publication of a new biography by Matthew Dennison (Behind the Mask, 2014), about thirty years after Victoria Glendinning’s authoritative one, Vita (1983). Her love life and her skills as a gardener have been explored by critics such as Sarah Raven, Suzanne Raitt or Karyn Sproles. However, her fiction and her non-fiction remain underexplored by academic criticism even as her novels The Edwardians (1930), All Passion Spent (1931), her award-winning poem The Land (1926), her travel writing (Twelve Days in Persia, 1927) and her work on her garden, Sissinghurst, remain quite popular.This paper means to focus on a little-known work of non-fiction Vita Sackville-West published towards the end of the Second World War, The Women’s Land Army (1944). It came out two years after Grand Canyon (1942) – a work of speculative fiction staging the victory of the Nazis in the United States after they had won the Second Word War – and three years after Country Notes in Wartime (1941), a collection of essays that were first published in The New Statesman and Nation from August 1939 until 1941. The Women’s Land Army draws our attention to the lives of the women who joined the WLA during the Second World War. The status of this book is discussed here: is it mere propaganda, a historical document, or a piece of modernist writing? Raising such questions about the status of this non-fictional narrative helps to place the author within a modernist literary context. Ces derniers temps, on a pu assister à un regain d’intérêt pour la vie de Vita Sackville-West avec la publication de la nouvelle biographie de Matthew Dennison, Behind the Mask (2014), une trentaine d’années après celle de Victoria Glendinning, Vita (1983), qui avait fait autorité. Sa vie amoureuse et ses talents de jardinier ont été explorés par des critiques telles que Sarah Raven, Suzanne Raitt or Karyn Sproles. Cependant, ses œuvres de fiction et de non-fiction demeurent encore insuffisamment étudiées par la critique universitaire même si ses romans, comme The Edwardians (1930), All Passion Spent (1931), son poème The Land (1926) qui fut récompensé par le prix Hawthornden, ses récits de voyage (Twelve Days in Persia, 1927) et ses travaux sur son jardin de Sissinghurst sont très populaires.Cet article se propose de se pencher sur une œuvre non-fictionnelle peu connue de Vita Sackville-West qui fut publiée vers la fin de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, The Women’s Land Army (1944). Elle parut deux ans après Grand Canyon (1942), œuvre de science-fiction qui imagine la victoire des nazis aux Etats-Unis après qu’ils ont gagné la Seconde Guerre Mondiale, et trois ans après Country Notes in Wartime (1941), recueil d’essais qui furent initialement publiés dans The New Statesman and Nation entre août 1939 et 1941. The Women’s Land Army attire notre attention sur la vie des femmes qui s’enrôlèrent dans la WLA pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Le statut de cet ouvrage est examiné ici: s’agit-il d’un simple ouvrage de propagande, d’un livre d’histoire ou d’un écrit moderniste? Poser ces questions à propos de ce récit non-fictionnel permet de reconsidérer la place de l’auteur dans le contexte littéraire moderniste.
collection OpenEdition Journal
language Anglais
format Article ou chapitre numérique
building 0/Bibliothèque numérique/
1/Bibliothèque numérique/OpenEdition Journals/
topic modernism
history
women
invisibility
The Women’s Land Army
propaganda
histoire
modernisme
femmes
invisibilité
The Women’s Land Army
propagande
spellingShingle modernism
history
women
invisibility
The Women’s Land Army
propaganda
histoire
modernisme
femmes
invisibilité
The Women’s Land Army
propagande
REYNIER, Christine
The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing
description Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in Vita Sackville-West’s life, with the publication of a new biography by Matthew Dennison (Behind the Mask, 2014), about thirty years after Victoria Glendinning’s authoritative one, Vita (1983). Her love life and her skills as a gardener have been explored by critics such as Sarah Raven, Suzanne Raitt or Karyn Sproles. However, her fiction and her non-fiction remain underexplored by academic criticism even as her novels The Edwardians (1930), All Passion Spent (1931), her award-winning poem The Land (1926), her travel writing (Twelve Days in Persia, 1927) and her work on her garden, Sissinghurst, remain quite popular.This paper means to focus on a little-known work of non-fiction Vita Sackville-West published towards the end of the Second World War, The Women’s Land Army (1944). It came out two years after Grand Canyon (1942) – a work of speculative fiction staging the victory of the Nazis in the United States after they had won the Second Word War – and three years after Country Notes in Wartime (1941), a collection of essays that were first published in The New Statesman and Nation from August 1939 until 1941. The Women’s Land Army draws our attention to the lives of the women who joined the WLA during the Second World War. The status of this book is discussed here: is it mere propaganda, a historical document, or a piece of modernist writing? Raising such questions about the status of this non-fictional narrative helps to place the author within a modernist literary context.
author REYNIER, Christine
author_facet REYNIER, Christine
author_sort REYNIER, Christine
title The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing
title_short The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing
title_full The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing
title_fullStr The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing
title_full_unstemmed The Women’s Land Army (1944): Vita Sackville-West’s Non-Fictional Wartime Writing
title_sort women’s land army (1944): vita sackville-west’s non-fictional wartime writing
publisher E-rea
publishDate 2020
container_title URI:https://journals.openedition.org/erea
url https://ezproxy.univ-orleans.fr/login?url=https://doi.org/10.4000/erea.9721
https://ezproxy.univ-orleans.fr/login?url=https://journals.openedition.org/erea/9721
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