Virginia Nicholson – författare

The newly revised and updated Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden is the definitive publication on the Bloomsbury Group's rural outpost in the heart of the Sussex Downs.“It’s absolutely perfect…”, wrote the artist Vanessa Bell when she moved to Charleston in 1916. For fifty years, Vanessa and her fellow painter Duncan Grant lived, loved and worked in this isolated Sussex farmhouse, together transforming the house and garden into an extraordinary work of art and creating a rural retreat for the Bloomsbury group. Now, Vanessa’s son, Quentin Bell, and her granddaughter Virginia Nicholson tell the inside story of their family home, linking it with some of the pioneering cultural figures who spent time there, including Vanessa’s sister Virginia Woolf, the economist Maynard Keynes, the writer Lytton Strachey and the art critic Roger Fry. Taking readers through each room of the house – from Clive Bell's Study, the Dining Room, the Kitchen and the Garden Room, through to individual bedrooms, the Studios and the Library – Quentin Bell relives old memories, including having T.S. Eliot over for a dinner party and staging plays in the Studio, while Virginia Nicholson details the artistic techniques (stencilling, embroidery, painting, sculpture, ceramics and more) used to embellish and enliven the once simple farmhouse.In this refreshed edition of the original 1997 publication, Gavin Kingcombe’s specially commissioned photographs breathe life into the colourful interiors and garden of the Sussex farmhouse, while updated text and captions by Virginia Nicholson capture the evolution of Charleston as it continues to inspire a new generation.For lovers of literature, decorative arts, and all things Bloomsbury, Charleston: A Bloomsbury House & Garden offers a window onto a truly unique creative hub.

'Sits you at the dressing table of history: a place of dreams, doubts, self-harm and hopes' -Sunday TimesAt the heart of this history is the female body. The century-span between the crinoline and the bikini witnessed more mutations in the ideal western woman's body shape than at any other period. In this richly detailed account, Virginia Nicholson, described as 'one of the great social historians of our time...' (Amanda Foreman) and a truly brilliant researcher has produced a most remarkable social history revealing the power, the pain and the pleasure involved in adorning the female body. She asks how custom, colour, class and sex fit into the picture, and shrewdly charts how the advances made by feminism collided with the changing shape of desirability. Full of surprising facts - the feminist plastic surgeon, the radioactive corset - alongside stories of the 'New Women' who discovered freedom by bobbing their hair, those who were the early adopters of trousers, and early Black beauty entrepreneurs, this book chronicles the codes, the contradictions, the lies and the highs of beauty. Virginia Nicholson shows how the pursuit of beauty can be oppressive but also a way of negotiating the world and that adornment can be a deep pleasure. It's complicated!`This is a fascinating book: funny, unexpected, forgiving, political, personal, glamorous and yes, quietly, angry. Read it for the amazing stories; stay for the self-knowledge. Or the Revolution' -Louisa Young, Prospect

Virginia Nicholson's Among the Bohemians is a portrait of England's artistic community in the first half of the twentieth century, engaged in a grand experiment.Subversive, eccentric and flamboyant - the Bohemians ate garlic and didn't always wash; they painted and danced and didn't care what people thought. They sent their children to co-ed schools; explored homosexuality and Free Love. They were often drunk, broke and hungry but they were rebels.In this fascinating book Virginia Nicholson examines the way the Bohemians refashioned the way we live our lives.'Interesting, gorgeous, wonderful.... this book displays the best of bohemia itself - playful, dazzling, original' Julie Burchill, Spectator'Racy, vivacious, warm-hearted. Offers an illuminating and well-researched portrait of life among the artists, a century ago' Miranda Seymour, TLSVirginia Nicholson was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. She has worked as a documentary researcher for BBC Television and her first book, Charleston - A Bloomsbury House and Garden (written in collaboration with her father, Quentin Bell), was an account of the Sussex home of her grandmother, the painter Vanessa Bell. Her second book, Among the Bohemians: Experiments in Living 1900-1939, was published by Penguin in 2002. She lives in Sussex.

Virginia Nicholson's Singled Out is the touching and beautifully told story of the women who were left alone after World War I - a remarkable generation of women who were changed by war; and in their turn helped change society.In 1919 a generation of young women discovered that there were, quite simply, not enough men to go round, and the statistics confirmed it. After the 1921 Census, the press ran alarming stories of the 'Problem of the Surplus Women - Two Million who can never become Wives...'. This book is about those women, and about how they were forced, by a tragedy of historic proportions, to stop depending on men for their income, their identity and their future happiness.'This is a ground-breaking book, richly nuanced with titbits of information, insight and understanding' Daily Mail 'Remarkably perceptive and well-researched ... Virginia Nicholson has produced another extraordinarily interesting work, sensitive, intelligent and well-written' Sunday Telegraph 'This in an inspiring book, lovingly researched, well-written and humane... the period is beautifully caught' Economist 'Brave, humane and honest' Observer Virginia Nicholson was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. She has worked as a documentary researcher for BBC Television and her first book, Charleston - A Bloomsbury House and Garden (written in collaboration with her father, Quentin Bell), was an account of the Sussex home of her grandmother, the painter Vanessa Bell. Her second book, Among the Bohemians: Experiments in Living 1900-1939, was published by Penguin in 2002. She lives in Sussex.

In Millions Like Us Virginia Nicholson tells the story of the women's Second World War, through a host of individual women's experiences. We tend to see the Second World War as a man's war, featuring Spitfire crews and brave deeds on the Normandy beaches. But in conditions of "Total War" millions of women - in the Services and on the Home Front - demonstrated that they were cleverer, more broad-minded and altogether more complex than anyone had ever guessed. Millions Like Us tells the story of how these women loved, suffered, laughed, grieved and dared; how they re-made their world in peacetime. And how they would never be the same again ...'Vividly entertaining, uplifting and humbling, Millions Like Us deserves to be a bestseller' Bel Mooney, The Daily Mail'Passionate, fascinating, profoundly sympathetic' Artemis Cooper, Evening Standard Virginia Nicholson was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and grew up in Yorkshire and Sussex. She studied at Cambridge University and lived abroad in France and Italy, then worked as a documentary researcher for BBC Television. Her books include the acclaimed social history Among the Bohemians - Experiments in Living 1900-1939, and Singled Out - How Two Million Women Survived Without Men after the First World War, both published by Penguin in 2002 and 2007. She is married to a writer, has three children and lives in Sussex.

In Perfect Wives in Ideal Homes, Virginia Nicholson tells the story of women in the 1950s: a time before the Pill, when divorce spelled scandal and two-piece swimsuits caused mass alarm.Turn the page back to the mid-twentieth century, and discover a world peopled by women with radiant smiles, clean pinafores and gleaming coiffures; a promised land of batch-baking, maraschino cherries and brightly hued plastic. A world where the darker side of the decade encompassed rampant prostitution, a notorious murder, and the threat of nuclear disaster. Perfect Wives in Ideal Homes reconstructs the real 1950s, through the eyes of the women who lived it. Step back in time to when our grandmothers scrubbed their doorsteps, cared for their families, lived, laughed, loved and struggled. This is their story.

'One of the great social historians of our time. No one else makes history this fun' Amanda Foreman'How Was It For You? subtly but powerfully subverts complacent male assumptions about a legendary decade' David Kynaston--------------------------------"A feeling that we could do whatever we liked swept through us in the 60s . . ."The sixties: a decade of space travel, utopian dreams and - above all - sexual revolution. It liberated a generation. But mostly men.Meet dollybird Mavis, debutante Kristina, bunny girl Patsy, industrial campaigner Mary and countercultural Caroline. From Carnaby Street to Merseyside, white gloves to Black is Beautiful, their stories illustrate a turbulent power struggle, throwing an unsparing spotlight on morals, drugs, race, bomb culture and sex.This is a moving, shocking book about tearing up the world and starting again. It's about peace, love and psychedelia, but also misogyny, violation and discrimination, in a decade discovering a new cause: equality.And women would never be the same again.--------------------------------'Sparkling . . . there is a wonderfully diverse range of voices . . . we have a long way to go, but reading this book made me grateful for how far we have come' Daisy Goodwin, The Sunday Times'An absorbing study of an extraordinary age. Beautifully written and intensively researched' Selina Hastings

'No one else makes history this fun' AMANDA FOREMAN'All the Rage sits you at the dressing table of history: a place of dreams, doubts, self-harm and hopes' SARAH DITUM, SUNDAY TIMES'Wonderfully engaging' HARPER'S BAZAARAt the heart of this history is the female body.The century-span between the crinoline and the bikini witnessed more mutations in the ideal western woman's body shape than at any other period. In this richly detailed account, Virginia Nicholson, described as 'one of the great social historians of our time...' (Amanda Foreman) takes us to the Frontline of Beauty to reveal the power, the pain and the pleasure involved in adorning the female body.The PowerWho determines which shape is currently 'all the rage'? Looking at how custom, colour, class and sex fit into the picture, this book also charts how the advances made by feminism collided with the changing shape of desirability.The PainHere is Gladys, who had botched surgery on her nose; Dorothy, whose skin colour lost her an Oscar; Beccy who took slimming pills and died; and - unbelievably - the radioactive corset.The PleasureHere are the 'New Women' who discovered freedom by bobbing their hair; the boyish, athletic 'Health and Beauty' ladies in black knickers; and starlets in bohemian beachwear. Among the first to experience true women's liberation were the early adopters of trousers.Encompassing two world wars and a revolution in women's rights, All the Rage tells the story of western female beauty from 1860 to 1960, chronicling its codes, its contradictions, its lies, its highs - and its underlying power struggle.