Woolf scholar Hankins to lecture at Duke University

Leslie Kathleen Hankins, Cornell College professor of English and creative writing and past president of the International Virginia Woolf Society, will speak at Duke University about the various writing surfaces used by Woolf throughout her life.

The talk, “Virginia Woolf: Writing Surfaces and Writing Depths,” is on March 3.

Hankins will speak in Duke’s Rubenstein Library where Virginia Woolf’s writing desk is on display. According to a Duke news story, Hankins will address:

How did this desk shape the apprenticeship of Virginia Stephen into a writer? What did she write at this desk?

How did it launch her career? In addition to the desk at Duke, Hankins will discuss Woolf’s decorated writing table in Cassis, as well as an overstuffed chair and lap board in a storage room at Hogarth Press and in Woolf’s writing shed. Along the way, she will consider how Woolf’s desk selections demonstrate a nuanced negotiation of gender performance and the writing profession as she crafted an innovative writing space through standing/walking/and shabby chic desk strategies.