Virginia woolf gay

Instead of lesbian, gay or bisexual, the term most commonly used by Vita and Virginia to describe their "proclivities" is "Sapphist": a euphemism after Sappho, an ancient poet of sensual verse about women, who lived on the Greek island of Lesbos (inspiring, too, the word ‘lesbian’).

Louise de Salvo, the American Woolf scholar, has claimed that "sexual abuse was probably the central and most formative feature of her early life," and she alleges that "virtually every male member of the Stephen household was engaged in this behaviour." She uses the term incest without qualification.