![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Orlando-2-225x300.jpg\")
<\/p>\nHelvitiq<\/p>\n
Review by David Starkey<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Virginia Woolf\u2019s Orlando: A Biography, a novel about a male Elizabethan aristocrat who, at the age of 100, turns into a woman, has inspired a number of versions in other media, including Sally Potter\u2019s film starring Tilda Swinton, along with a range of stage adaptations. It\u2019s not surprising, therefore, that the book would also be the basis for a graphic novel. As Woolf scholar Anna Snaith notes in the introduction, \u201cSusanne Kuhlendahl\u2019s graphic adaptation\u2026seems particularly apt given that Woolf often thought and worked across verbal and visual modes\u2026. The original text of Orlando included images and photographs,\u201d with a focus on Vita Sackville-West, Woolf\u2019s lover and the model for the novel\u2019s protagonist.<\/p>\n
Orlando is a shortish book, but of course it\u2019s much longer than the text to be found in a version taken up mostly by pictures. Kuhlendahl, who has also written a graphic novel version of Death in Venice, addresses this disparity by quoting judiciously and sparingly from the original. Occasionally, as in the pivotal moment after Orlando changes from a man to a woman, she quotes Woolf exactly: \u201cLet biologists and psychologists determine. It is enough for us to state the simple fact; Orlando was a man till the age of thirty; when he became a woman and has remained so ever since.\u201d<\/p>\n
More often, though, Kuhlendahl must hit the highlights, which inevitably eliminates the texture of Woolf\u2019s authorial voice. Toward the end of both books, for instance, the ageless Orlando, who has lived through the 300 years of English history, finds herself in the twentieth century. Kuhlendahl writes: \u201cIt was 1928. It was the present moment. And Orlando was terribly late.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Woolf\u2019s original, in between second and third sentence of the graphic novel, which are direct quotes, we are offered this reflection: \u201cNo one need wonder that Orlando started, pressed her hand to her heart, and turned pale. For what more terrifying revelation can there be than that it is the present moment? That we survive the shock at all is only possible because the past shelters us on one side, the future on another.\u201d That\u2019s a nice bit of Woolfian writing, both serious\u2014being intensely aware of oneself at any given time can, indeed, be \u201cterrifying\u201d\u2014but of course it\u2019s always the present moment, so there\u2019s some gentle irony there as well.<\/p>\n
If that\u2019s the sort of observation that\u2019s lost in the graphic novel, what\u2019s gained is a great deal of fun. The two-page, full-color spread that depicts Orlando\u2019s epiphany shows her rushing to get dressed, hurrying down a spiral staircase and out into the street where she hops into her motorcar, which she drives recklessly down a London street as hapless pedestrians jump out of her way.<\/p>\n
The visual element must make up for the loss of language in a graphic novel, and, fortunately, Kuhlendahl has a light, sometimes whimsical touch with her pen and ink and watercolor illustrations. Among the highlights are a spread showing the ice melting on the Thames after the Great Frost of 1608, another depicting the passage of seasons and years, a wordless rainbow-colored rendition of a ball, and Orlando\u2019s heady love affair with Marmaduke Bonthrop Shelmerdine. Kuhlendahl loves to draw, and every page is brimming with images.<\/p>\n
Woolf herself appears frequently in the graphic novel version, commenting, as she does in the original, on her characters and their behavior. She looks amused more often than bemused, though at times she is also sad or angry. The roman \u00e0 clef element of the novel is highlighted by the fact that Kuhlendahl\u2019s drawings of Orlando as a woman look very much like photographs of Vita Sackville-West. Interestingly, while Orlando is mostly a sympathetic protagonist, Woolf apparently didn\u2019t think much of Sackville-West\u2019s literary efforts: Orlando\u2019s poetry is mercilessly mocked throughout both books.<\/p>\n
But what about the bastardization of a classic, some might worry. Do we really need an Orlando graphic novel? Actually, I think so. Rather than replacing the original, Kuhlendahl\u2019s version is much more likely to motivate readers to take yet another turn through Woolf\u2019s masterpiece.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Helvitiq Review by David Starkey Virginia Woolf\u2019s Orlando: A Biography, a novel about a male Elizabethan aristocrat who,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":182436,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[139,141,140],"class_list":{"0":"post-182435","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-orlando","8":"tag-orlando","9":"tag-orlando-headlines","10":"tag-orlando-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182435\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}