Book Club Discussion Guide
About the Book
No Signposts in the Sea
by Vita Sackville-West
Edmund Carr is at sea in more ways than one. An eminent journalist and selfmade man, he has recently discovered that he has only a short time to live.
Leaving his job on a Fleet Street paper, he takes a passage on a cruise ship
where he knows that Laura, a beautiful and intelligent widow whom he secretly
admires, will be a fellow passenger. Exhilarated by the distant vista of exotic
islands and his conversations with Laura, Edmund finds himself rethinking all his
values. A voyage on many levels, those long purposeless days at sea find
Edumnd relinquishing the past as he discovers the joys and the pain of a love he
is simultaneously determined to conceal.
About the Author
English poet and novelist, born into an old aristocratic family, proprietors of Knole
House in Kent, which was a private country estate with 365 rooms. Vita
Sackville-West wrote about the Kentish countryside and was the chief model for
the Orlando character in Virginia Woolf's novel of that same title from 1928.
Sackville-West's best known poem, THE LAND, was awarded the Hawthorne
Prize in 1927.
Victoria Mary Sackville-West was the only child of Lionel Edward, third Baron of
Sackville, and Victoria Josepha Dolores Catalina Sackville-West, his first cousin
and the illegitimate daughter of the diplomat Sir Lionel Sackville-West. She was
educated privately. As a child she started to write poetry, writing her first ballads
at the age of 11. "I don't remember either my father or my mother very vividly at
that time, except that Dada used to take me for terribly long walks and talk to me
about science, principally Darwin, and I liked him a great deal better than Mother,
of whose quick temper I was frightened." (from Portrait of a Marriage by Nigel
Nicolson, 1973) Vita's mother considered her ugly - she was bony, she had long
legs, straight hair, and she wanted to be as boyish as possible.
Between 1906 and 1910 Sackville-West produced eight novels and five plays.
CHATTERTON, A DRAMA IN THREE ACTS, was privately printed and appeared
in 1909. In 1913 she married the diplomat and critic Harold Nicolson, with whom
she lived a long time in Persia and then at the Sissinghurst Castle in Kent. At first
she played her role as a dutiful wife, but then her husband admitted that he had a
male lover. The marriage endured despite their homosexual affairs, but Harold's
affairs were less passionate than Vita's. They had two children, the art critic
Benedict Nicholson and the publisher Nigel Nicolson. In 1923 the art critic Clive
Bell introduced Sackville-West to Virginia Woolf, and the two became lovers.
According to an anecdote, when Nigel was a child, an adult told him, that
"Virginia loves your mother," he had replied, "Yes, of course she does: we all do."
Sackville-West also had affairs with Hilda Matheson, head of the BBC Talk
Department, and Mary Campbell, married to the poet Roy Campbell, but her life
long companion was Violet (Keppel) Trefusis, the daughter of Alice Keppel,
Edward VII's mistress
Violet and Vita had met in childhood in 1904. Violet, who was two years younger,
gave Vita a ring in 1908 when they both were teen-agers - it was her first gesture
of affection and tenderness. "She is mine," Sackville-West wrote later in her
diary, but they did not meet much before the late 1910s. Vita fell also in love with
another girl, Rosamund Grosvenor, who was four years older than Vita. Violet's
and Vita's relationship continued until after their respective marriages. At one
point they 'eloped' to France but in 1921 Violet returned to her husband Denys
Trefusis. This long relationship was the subject of Sackville-West's secret diary
and gave material for her third novel, CHALLENGE. It depicted a Greek vineyard
owner who was torn between his love for a woman and for his island home.
Sackville-West's father died in 1928 and his brother became the fourth Baron
Sackville, inheriting Knole. Her husband decided in 1929 to resign from the
foreign service and devote himself to writing. They purchased Sissinghurst
Castle, a near-derelict house, and started to restore it. In the 1930s SackvilleWest published THE EDWARDIANS (1930), ALL PASSION SPENT (1931), and
FAMILY HISTORY (1932) which were bestsellers, portraying English upper-class
manners and life. PEPITA (1937) depicted the story of her grandmother, who
was a Spanish dancer. Her passionate gardening was rewarded in 1955 by the
Royal Horticultural Society. Sackville-West also wrote several books about
gardening and kept a regular column at the Observer from 1946.
In 1946 Sackville-West was made a Companion of Honour for her services to
literature. She died of cancer on June 2, 1962. Harold Nicolson died six years
later. Sackville-West believed in equal rights for women. She is best remembered
for her novels but her most enduring work was perhaps the garden at
Sissinghurst Castle, evidently the joint creation of Harold and Vita, and as Nigel
Nicolson suggested the true "portrait of their marriage." Nicolson published in
1973 a book, Portrait of a Marriage, which was based on her parents' journals
and notes, and described their private life and marriage. The book was made into
a television mini-series in 1990, starring Cathryn Harrison, Janet McTeer and
David Haigh.
Discussion Questions
1. What is the general function of a “sign post”?
2. What is the special feature of a sea? What can you predict about the
implication of the title of the text?
3. Suppose if one has been informed that one’s days in the world are
numbered, what do you think one may choose to do as the best option?
4. What is the ultimate purpose of the author to have three main characters
in the novel?
5. What can you imagine the theme of the story would be by considering the
personal backgrounds of Edmund Carr, Laura and Colonels?
6. What is the implication of the title now after the introduction?
7. What was the emotional reaction to the abrupt change for Edmond Carr
himself? What he realized the sudden change of the way of life? Can you
find any example to illustrate or explain this kind of sudden change?
8. What did the author imply by mentioning the concept of “hard materialist”?
9. Why did the author refer to the natural scenery from time to time? Was it
just a matter of coincidence or a deliberate arrangement?
10. What is the implication of depicting two kinds of the description of two
kinds of natural scenery: that vast expanse of desert where nothing could
escape from the view of the people and the steep cliffs where there were
beautiful flowers and plantations were growing without being disturbed or
even damaged?