ART & LIFE: Michael Holroyd on Lytton Strachey (1880-1932)

POSTCARD BIOGRAPHIES FROM THE NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY

Michael Holroyd
Sunday 01 March 1998 01:02 GMT
Comments

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

After the success of the first series of postcard biographies taken from the NPG's archives, this is a new series of specially commissioned 70-word biographies of and by major figures of today. This is the last in the current series

An early member of the Bloomsbury Group, Lytton Strachey gained fame in 1918 with Eminent Victorians, a brilliant attack on those 19th- century values he believed had led to the Great War. His Queen Victoria (1921) and Elizabeth and Essex (1928), which liberated biography for future experiments, used the devices of romantic fiction and psychological melodrama to smuggle the unorthodox personal relationships of his own life into Britain's national heritage.

Lytton Strachey by Simon Bussy, 1904 c Reserved. The NPG has produced a pack of 25 Art & Life pull-out postcards (pounds 5) featuring the best of the series, including Virginia Woolf on George Eliot and Terry Pratchett on Tolkein. Mail order 0171 306 0055 x280/fax 0171 306 0092. Add pounds 1 p& p for up to two packs, pounds 1.50 thereafter.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in