Angelica Garnett

Infobox Person
name = Angelica Bell Garnett


birth_date = birth date and age|1918|12|25
death_date =
spouse = David Garnett (separated)
children = Amaryllis Garnett
Henrietta Garnett
Nerissa Garnett
Frances Garnett
family = Vanessa Bell, mother
Clive Bell, father
Julian Bell, brother
Quentin Bell, brother

Angelica Vanessa Garnett (née Bell, born 25 December 1918) is a British writer and painter. She is the illegitimate daughter of the painters Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell, sister of Virginia Woolf, and was a member of the Bloomsbury Group. [http://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/db/node.xsp?id=EAD%2FGBR%2F0272%2FPP%2FAG The Papers of Angelica Garnett (née Bell)] , King's College, Cambridge.]

Her mother's husband, Clive Bell, was not her biological father, but was fully supportive of her mother's love affair with Grant, and willingly allowed Angelica to bear his name and to regard him as her father in order that his conservative family not disinherit her. She was not told of her true parentage until she was seventeen, although she had grown up living with Grant and her mother at Charleston Farmhouse in Sussex/England, which her mother had rented and shared with other members of the Bloomsbury Group. The farmhouse is now a museum.2]

She had two half-brothers: poet Julian Bell, who was killed during the Spanish Civil War in 1937; and art historian Quentin Bell.3]

She married David Garnett, the former lover of her biological father, Duncan Grant, in 1942, but they later separated. They had four daughters: Amaryllis Virginia (1943-1973), an actress; Henrietta Catherine Vanessa, a writer (b. 1945); and twins Nerissa Stephen (1946-2004), called Nel, a painter, photographer and ceramics artist; and Frances, called Fanny (also b. 1946).4]

Angelica Garnett is the author of a memoir, "Deceived with Kindness", which focuses on her relationship with both of her biological parents. Its somewhat bitter view of both Bell and Grant has proven controversial. [Malcolm, Janet: [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C05E2DC1E39F930A35750C0A960958260 Sisters, Lovers, Tarts and Friends] , "The New York Times", 3 March 1996.] The memoir was awarded the J. R. Ackerley Prize for Autobiography in 1985. [ [http://www.englishpen.org/prizes/pastjrackerleyprizewinners/ Past J.R. Ackerley Prize winners] , "English Pen".]

References

* [http://www.charleston.org.uk/ Charleston Farmhouse]