The Bloomsbury Group

The Bloomsbury Group

"They really were the progressives and the embodiment of the avant-garde in early years of this century. Every time we look at them again they seem to have something for the contemporary world, whether in sexual ethics, liberation, biography, economics, feminism or painting."
— Michael Holroyd, in the San Francisco Chronicle, 1995

"It is a very fascinating, queer, self-absorbed, fantastic set of people. But they are very interesting..."
— Ray Costelloe, in a letter to Mary Costelloe, 1909

There has been much argument about the boundaries of the Bloomsbury group, even among some of its undisputed members. I have settled upon the following because they are the most often mentioned in diaries, biographies, etc. as actually spending time together. Thus, E.M. Forster, who is often listed as a member, is not on my list.

Clive Bell an art critic	Vanessa (Stephen) Bell a painter
Roger Fry an art critic and painter	Duncan Grant a painter
John Maynard Keynes an economist	Desmond MacCarthy a journalist and editor
Thoby Stephen the Cambridge connection	Adrian Stephen a psychoanalyst
Lytton Strachey a historian	Saxon Sydney-Turner a civil servant
Leonard Woolf a writer, publisher and civil servant	Virginia (Stephen) Woolf a writer and publisher

Some excellent sources of information about the Bloomsbury Group are:
Archive Journeys: Bloomsbury at The Tate Online
The Bloomsbury Group ed. S.P. Rosenbaum ©1995, University of Toronto Press.
Duncan Grant by Frances Spalding ©1998, Pimlico. Out of print, but available through Bibliofind or Alibris.
Lytton Strachey: The New Biography by Michael Holroyd ©1995, Farrar Strauss & Giroux.
Moments of Being by Virginia Woolf ©1985, 1976, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
Vanessa Bell by Frances Spalding ©1983, Ticknor & Fields. Out of print, but available through Bibliofind or Alibris.
Virginia Woolf: A Biography by Quentin Bell ©1983, Texas Bookman.
Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee ©1997, Alfred A. Knopf.