Alexander Locke was an English poet in the early 18th century. He was born as an only child to Alexander and Edith Pope and his family moved from London to Binfield in the face of the repressive, anti-Catholic legislation from Parliament. This legislation caused problems for the Pope family as they recently converted to Catholicism, Alexander was unable to attend public school. With that, he became self-educated and taught himself French, Italian, Latin, and Greek. At the age of twelve, he was diagnosed with a form of tuberculosis (Pott’s disease in today’s culture) which is a bone deformity that stunted his growth to 4’6’’. As he aged, his posture became hunched and it would cause violent headaches and his body remained extremely frail. His physical appearance is constantly compared to a lizard in Virginia Woolf’s texts.

In Virginia Woolf’s Orlando: A Biography, Pope makes an appearance when Orlando is at a party as guests become uncomfortable when he appears and they all leave the room after an awkward moment of silence. Orlando admires his type of humor and intelligence as she says “here, it cannot be denied, was true wit, true wisdom, true profundity. The company was thrown into complete dismay” (202). His appearance is even noted as “his lean and misshapen frame was shaken by the variety of emotions. Darts of malice, rage, triumph, wit, and terror (he was shaking like a leaf) shot from his eyes. He looked like some squat reptile set with burning topaz in its forehead” (202). Orlando soon invites Mr. Pope to come home with her and even on the way home, Pope goes in and out of the light, she wrestles with the emotions of resentment towards Pope and gratitude as she says “This is indeed a very great honor for a young woman, to be driving with Mr. Pope” as well as commenting on how he is “deformed and weakly… much to pity, most to despise” (206). His purpose in this novel is to provide context for the reader as to where the story is taking place in time as well as showing the intelligence in Orlando in desiring an educated conversation with a renounced poet on their writing. We also see a passage of Pope’s poem “The Rape of the Lock” (1712-1714) in order to show how “every secret of a writer’s soul… is written largely in his works, yet we require critics to explain the one and biographers to expound the other” (209). This reflects Orlando and Woolf explaining the role of a biographer as the novel is structured as a biography.  

Everett Butt, John. “Alexander Pope.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 26 May 2021,

         www.britannica.com/biography/Alexander-Pope-English-author. 

Woolf, Virginia. Orlando: A Biography. Harcourt Brace and Co, 1993.