Mrs Dalloway is Published."> The Origin of a Masterpiece This first appeared in Lit Hub’s  Literary History  newsletter— sign up here . In August 1922, Virginia Woolf turned to a blank page in one of her notebooks to take a few notes on “a book to be called, perhaps, At Home: or The Party.” From her notebook: This is to be a short book consisting of six or seven chapters, each complete separately, yet there must be some sort of fusion. And all must converge upon the party at the end My idea is to have some very [ ] characters, like Mrs Dalloway much in relief: then to have interludes of thought, or reflection, or short digressions (which must be related, logically, to the rest) all compact, yet not jerked. Then follows a list of potential chapters, beginning with “ Mrs Dalloway in Bond Street ,” a short story which she had recently finished (and in the first line of which Mrs.…