Read: Mrs. Woolf and the Servants

If I've talked to you about reading recently, I've probably gushed about my latest find, Alison Light's Mrs Woolf & the Servants: "Virginia Woolf was a feminist and a bohemian, but without her servants-- cooking, cleaning and keeping house-- she might never have managed to write. While I like and admire non-fiction, I rarely find it as riveting and compelling a read as a novel. This book, however, was one that I had a hard time putting down. Perhaps it's my deep fondness for Woolf's novels or my vexed relationship with her notion of "the room of one's own." It might be my own puzzlement over how to carve out time to write among all the other things that demand precedence or my intrigue with the telling of lost histories. Or my admiration of excellent research and elegant prose. Likely, this book's appeal for me is a combination of all of these. The Times says it is "an invaluable glimpse into the hidden history of domestic service in an absorbing narrative, beautifully written" and the Observer calls it "A scintillating meeting of biography, social history and literary criticism." It's a mighty fine read. Some visitors to the Cafe will find it at their local academic library.