Books and Characters (Barnes & Noble Digital Library)

Giles Lytton Strachey was born in 1880 into a well-educated, upper-middle class, and highly-eccentric family. His days at Cambridge led to his becoming a dominant member of the elite Bloomsbury group, which included such passionate thinkers as Maynard Keynes, E.M. Forester, and Leonard and Virginia Woolf. It was in this clique that Strachey was able to voice and support behavior that had previously been condemned, such as homosexuality, feminism, and opposition to World War I. Besides Eminent Victorians (1918), his biographical works include Queen Victoria (1921), Elizabeth and Essex (1928), and Portraits in Miniature (1931).