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Matthew Dennison - Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West - 9780007486960 - KKD0007390
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Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West

€ 17.95
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Description for Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West Hardcover. Aristocrat, literary celebrity, 'Rose Queen', devoted wife, lesbian, recluse, iconoclast - Vita Sackville-West was many things, but she was never straightforward. Her life is re-told here in a dazzling new biography. Num Pages: 384 pages. BIC Classification: BGL; DSBH. Category: (G) General (US: Trade). Dimension: 163 x 240 x 39. Weight in Grams: 746. Good clean copy with some minor shelf wear, dustwrapper has some minor edge wear but remains good

Aristocrat, literary celebrity, ‘Rose Queen’, devoted wife, lesbian, recluse, iconoclast – Vita Sackville-West was many things, but she was never straightforward. Her life is re-told here in a dazzling new biography.

Vita Sackville-West is perhaps best known as the creator, with her husband Harold Nicolson, of the gardens at Sissinghurst Castle, now the most visited gardens in Britain. In a career spanning more than forty years, she also made her mark as a prolific and accomplished writer. She was an award-winning poet, a best-selling novelist, a biographer, a travel writer ... Read more

Here, in the first biography to be written for thirty years, Matthew Dennison reveals a renegade, brave and charismatic woman: from a lonely childhood of immense privilege in her beloved family house Knole (which she, as a woman, could never inherit), to a celebrated and affectionate marriage which was nevertheless mutually ‘open’ and strewn with passionate homosexual affairs (in Vita's case, most famously with Virginia Woolf and Violet Trefusis); from the hubbub of jewel-encrusted parties at Buckingham Palace, to the solace Vita found in nature and gardening and the eventual seclusion of her tower at Sissinghurst.

Drawing on sources from archives across the globe as well as Vita's own prolific written output, Dennison traces the inspiration, triumphs and contradictions of Vita’s extraordinary life. Devoted wife, literary celebrity, 'Rose Queen', reluctant courtier, recluse, lesbian, iconoclast – Dennison deftly weaves together the myriad strands of Vita’s life to create a revealing and insightful portrait of the woman behind the mask.

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Product Details

Format
Hardback
Publication date
2014
Publisher
HarperCollins Publishers
Condition
Used, Good
Number of Pages
384
Place of Publication
London, United Kingdom
ISBN
9780007486960
SKU
KKD0007390
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 2 to 4 working days
Ref
99-1

About Matthew Dennison
Matthew Dennison is the author of seven critically acclaimed works of non-fiction, including ‘Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West’, a Book of the Year in The Times, Spectator, Independent and Observer. His most recent book is ‘Over the Hills and Far Away: The Life of Beatrix Potter’. He is a contributor to Country Life and Telegraph.

Reviews for Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West
BOOK OF THE YEAR as chosen by: The Times Independent Observer 'Dennison captures both Vita’s irresistible charm and her selfishness. Like his subject, he is a natural storyteller, and his impeccable scholarship never weighs down his ... Read more

Goodreads reviews for Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West


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