Orlando: An Opinion Piece

The point of calling the piece “Orlando: A Biography” instead of just “Orlando” is that

the third person point of view allows for us, the readers, to appreciate multiple perspectives in

the world Woolf is describing. For example, I find the contrast between how Orlando views

himself and how the world thinks of him extremely striking, therefore without this omniscient

point of view the reader wouldn’t be able to fully grasp how Orlando’s emotional struggles

negatively affect his relationship with society, which in turn spirals him deeper into a depression.

The novel starts out with Orlando, a teenage boy who loves nature, being readily

accepted by Elizabethan high society, and most importantly receiving praise from the Queen for

being “the very image of a gentleman” with “strength, grace, romance, folly, poetry, youth.”

(p.21) Then Orlando isolates himself in his castle during his first sad boy phase, which was due

to the death of the Queen and heartbreak over Sasha fleeing for her homeland, where he slept for

seven days straight. After waking up with no discernable signs of being in a coma, Orlando

continues reading and working on his poem “The Oak Tree”, and reflects on his adolescent years

under the watchful eye of the Court, specifically all the “instances of his unfitness for the life of

society, an ineffable hope, that all the turbulence of his youth, his clumsiness, his blushes, his

long walks, and his love of the country proved the he himself belonged to a sacred race rather

than to the noble.” (p.71-72) Orlando complains of feeling ostracized socially because he

perceives himself as being less than his fellow nobleman in terms of etiquette and looks now that

the the two women he adored most are not there to bolster his self-image, yet above his peers

intellectually because of his deep interest in literature. I believe Orlando’s love of nature is what

makes him a better person than the other royals. Orlando connects to his core value of nature’s

beauty when he finally breaks out of his glum mood and becomes an Ambassador in
Constantinople, a region which offered plentiful unique landscapes for Orlando to appreciate.

The people of Constantinople respond positively to Orlando’s content vibe, and describe him as

having “the power to stir the fancy and rivet the eye which will keep a memory green long after

all that more durable qualities can do to preserve it is forgotten” (p.107) While he views himself

as undeserving of a royal status, the lay people and other royals he encounters see him as the

perfect noble, an almost god like person considering the rumors and myths that follow him.

Despite not enjoying the ending I found the message of the book extremely interesting,

especially considering the liberation and courage it must have inspired in readers of the early to

mid twentieth century who had felt stuck between a rock and a hard place gender wise. The

purpose of writing Orlando was not just to be a love letter to Vita but also spread the notion that

it is possible to have “enjoyed the love of both sexes equally” while remaining true to oneself

and living a full life. (pg 190) It’s interesting that for a novel that is so centered around a humans

transformation from one gender to another and then their struggle of living a non gender binary

life, that the novel only uses the word gender once when describing how “one may sketch her

spending her morning in a China robe of ambiguous gender” (pg.190) This is significant as the

one time Woolf uses the term ‘gender’ she is using it to enhance her message that gender is not

intrinsic to happiness. Orlando “found it convenient at time to change frequently from one set of

clothes to another” because “she reaped a twofold harvest by this device; the pleasures of life

were increased and its experiences multiplied.” (pg.190) The idea that one may find as much joy

in fully immersing themselves in societies gender roles as they do breaking them, and neither act

should be discouraged was not prevalent in the twentieth century. Gender roles were rigid and

those who didn’t prescribe were sent to the loony bin so for Woolf to publish a novel where the

main character could never fully choose a gender was bold.

 This is another reason why I believe the four hundred year timeline was important to the

work as it distracted from the obvious queerness. The reason that time is fluid, i.e. how the book

spans four hundred years and certain characters deaths are not permanent, is because gender and

time are concepts created by humans to label and define the life around them. If it has a label, it

is known, and if it’s known then it can be controlled. Therefore this books takes the concepts we

assume to be universal truths and illustrates how they can limit one’s potential and happiness in

the effort to be accepted, to be recognized, and to be known by society.