“Radclyffe Hall” 81 after his death in 1971, admitted to Virginia Woolf that he found lesbians disgusting Though he had no interest in women himself, he did not like to think of them living independent of men Radclyffe Hall could not have been a more offensive model to him The attitudes of these two important members of the Bloomsbury group, whose general liberality and lack of convention were well known, are indications of how brave or foolhardy an act writing The Well of Loneliness was Sexuality was a subject of intense interest and speculation to the intellectuals of Bloomsbury, the concern of many letters, poems, and plays written for their own entertainment But even Lytton Strachey, whose buggery was notorious, maintained relationships most important to him with men who would not have him and women in whom he was not sexually interested He at one time proposed to Virginia Woolf and lived the last years of his life with the adoring Carrington, who was like a daughter to him Gossip, bawdy jokes, and flights of inventive fantasy were Bloomsbury’s way of dealing with bisexuality or inversion They were not prepared to deal publicly with sexual tastes nearly universally described as a sign of regression or degeneracy Virginia and Leonard Woolf were the English publishers of Freud If they were morally permissive, they were all of them psychologically ambivalent about themselves They were Radclyffe Hall’s brave allies (the Woolfs would have stood bail, not understanding at first that it was the book and not the author on trial), but they were not her friends, nor could they have been She was too outlandish, too earnest, and too little gifted There was nothing ambivalent about her at all Though Stephen Gordon, the main character in The Well of Loneliness, shares few of Radclyffe Hall’s own experiences, she is Radclyffe Hall’s idealized mirror Both recognized from childhood their essential difference from other females Both had early emotional ties with female servants Both were fine horsewomen and successful writers Neither had any erotic interest in men Both affected the same masculine style and manners But Radclyffe Hall gave Stephen basic securities she herself lacked, a father who loved and understood her, a childhood on a fine estate, good health, and a sound education Stephen was also very tall, a mark of masculine power and beauty Radclyffe Hall probably envied, though it is said of her that she always gave the impression of being a good deal taller than she was Of all the good fortunes they did not share, Stephen’s opportunity to serve