Essay Questions

In real life, Vita Sackville-West had several affairs with women during her supposedly sexless marriage to her husband. How are these experiences evident in her poems?

In “And So It Ends,” the narrator—who is presumably representative of Vita, herself—reflects upon the end of a tumultuous, and likely abusive relationship. Though Vita was passionately in love with her abuser, she is beginning to heal and accept the loss of her relationship. This sense—of being abused and misused—may have been present in Vita’s own life, due to her lesbian tendencies. It is possible that Vita wished to life her life as an open lesbian and yet felt trapped and emotionally enslaved in her heterosexual marriage. Similarly, in “Days I Enjoy,” the narrator describes how she prefers her own company to the company of others. She feels many introverted tendencies and finds social interaction to be particularly draining. This could stem from the fact that Vita may have felt isolated during her life due to her homosexuality.

How might Vita have drawn upon her own life experiences to craft these authentic poems?

During her marriage, Vita had several lesbian affairs. It was reported that her marriage was only documentation-deep and that Vita sought her emotional and sexual needs from other women. This sense of isolation is clearly evident in “Days I Enjoy,” where the narrator—representative of Vita, herself—reflects upon her introverted tendencies and how she prefers solitary days to others. This could be a result of the social judgement and marital isolation Vita may have felt. Comparatively, it is likely that Vita drew upon her fondest childhood experiences near a beach tree forest in “Beechwoods At Knole.” Vita uses this poem to reflect upon her fond childhood memories and memorialize them through the poem. She describes the trees, forest, and her warm memories associated with these experiences using authentic and accurate imagery.

Several of Vita’s poems pertain to lost love and emotional suffering at the hands of a lover. Though these poems are written under the assumption that this abusive and/or lost lover is a man, is it feasible that these relationships could have been grounded in a lesbian relationship?

Given Vita’s own lesbian affairs, the assumption that the subject of these poems could be female is certainly possible. In “And So It Ends,” the narrator describes in great detail the violent and tumultuous circumstances surrounding the relationship she describes in this poem. Much of the abuse the narrator describes is emotional and mental. As such, it is certainly possible that the abuser Vita describes could be one of her female lovers. Additionally, at the end of this poem, the abuser—when defending their reason for breaking off the affair—cites God as an influencing factor. Given the historical context of Vita’s life, it is possible that a lesbian woman would have felt compelled to cite religion—which historically promotes heterosexual relationships—as a reason for breaking off the relationship.