Virginia Woolf's Orlando, "the longest and most charming love letter in literature," playfully constructs the figure of Orlando as the fictional embodiment ofWoolf's close friend and lover, Vita Sackville-West.Spanning three .centuries of boisterous, fantastic adventure, the novel opens as Orlando, a young nobleman in Elizabeth's England, awaits a visit from the Queen a.nd traces his experience with first love as England under/ames I lies locked in the embrace of the Great Frost.……