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A review by emmkayt
Square Haunting: Five Writers in London Between the Wars by Francesca Wade
4.0
An absorbing, thoughtful group biography of sorts, though the subjects had only glancing interaction or overlap and each gets her own chapter. The writers H.D. (Hilda Doolittle), Dorothy Sayers, and Virginia Woolf, as well as the classicist Jane Harrison and the historian Eileen Power all happened to live for some portion of time during and between the wars in Mecklenburgh Square in Bloomsbury. This linkage proves the impetus for Wade to explore how each woman grappled with the tensions and challenges of pursuing her work and forming relationships in the face of patriarchal societal structures.
I especially enjoyed the chapters on Dorothy Sayers and Eileen Power, as well as the sometimes tenuous, often insightful and sensitive connections that the author made. Beautifully researched with a good index (so few books seem to have these lately) and lovely endnotes too (though I would have liked some indication within the text that a point was endnoted). If I had a particular wish, it would be for a more diverse lens - I was very interested in Power’s work to destabilize Eurocentrism, she was quite amazing, and there was some interesting exploration of Woolf’s rather weird attitude to servants - but I did really feel the fact that I was reading about a very narrow, very apparently white milieu of a certain class.
I especially enjoyed the chapters on Dorothy Sayers and Eileen Power, as well as the sometimes tenuous, often insightful and sensitive connections that the author made. Beautifully researched with a good index (so few books seem to have these lately) and lovely endnotes too (though I would have liked some indication within the text that a point was endnoted). If I had a particular wish, it would be for a more diverse lens - I was very interested in Power’s work to destabilize Eurocentrism, she was quite amazing, and there was some interesting exploration of Woolf’s rather weird attitude to servants - but I did really feel the fact that I was reading about a very narrow, very apparently white milieu of a certain class.