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bookcrazylady45's review
4.0
Finally a definitive, accurate biography of a grand dame. Name almost any writer, poet, artist, politician, Bloomsberry, aristocrat from `1905-1938 and you will find a connection to Ottoline. Her portrait was painted by more artists, she was caricatured and pilloried in more novels by now famous writers in books that went on to become classics, her name appears in more biographies and her biography is filled with the names of people she helped before they became famous. She was one of a kind. This particular biography was made possible by the availability of the 2500 letters to her from Bertrand Russell, and all her personal papers including the letters exchanged with Lytton Strachey. The truth set against the scurrilous attacks on her by the Bloomsberries in their correspondence that was used in previous accounts of her life as fact. She deserves her place in history. Tilda Swinton played her in the 1993 movie Wittgenstein as flamboyant and colourful.
neom's review
4.0
Got a bit slow towards the end but otherwise this was a thoroughly engaging read about someone that I had never previously hear of. She struck me as either incredibly generous spirited or frustratingly naive. Either way, she seemed determined to do a great many good things and as well as her patronage of many incredible writers and artists, she helped prostitutes and poor women/families up until the end of her life. I was glad that a great many people wrote to her husband and daughter to say how much she meant to them but can’t help wishing they had been nicer to her whilst she was alive.
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