Virginia Woolf was never afraid to judge a book by its cover

What Lies Beneath: Vanessa Bell’s dust jacket for ‘To the Lighthouse’ by her sister Virginia Woolf in 1927

Vanessa Bell’s cover design for Virginia Woolf’s 'To the Lighthouse' first published on 5 May 1927

Niall MacMonagle

Ninety-seven years ago, Virginia Woolf published her masterpiece To the Lighthouse on May 5.

Woolf, in a letter to her sister Vanessa Bell, three days later, wrote: “Probably the subject was a little unwise: But then one falls in to these things all in a second – I made it up one afternoon in the Square [Tavistock] without any premeditation, that I can see – how do you make up pictures? Suddenly all in a second?”