TO: LEONARD WOOLF
Rodmell,
Sussex
Tuesday (18? March 1941)
Dearest, I feel certain I am going mad again. I feel we can’t go through another of those terrible times. And I shan’t recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can’t concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don’t think two people could have been happier till this terrible disease came. I can’t fight any longer. I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know. You see I can’t even write this properly. I can’t read. What I want to say is I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. I want to say that – everybody knows it. If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. I can’t go on spoiling your life any longer.
I don’t think two people could have been happier than we have been.
V.
March 28, 1941. After writing that note to her husband, Virginia Woolf put rocks in her pockets and drowned herself in the River Ouse.
This breaks my heart. That’s all I can say….
I know. It’s a wrenching letter. Even down to her getting the date wrong and putting a little question mark next to it. You can feel her disorientation right there. Terrible.
// If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. //
I was born on March 28th, 1941………………….I wonder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
this is not the version of the letter that I have. very interesting