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Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own
View the study guide below, or download the .pdf version.
Overview
A Room of One's Own began as a pair of lectures- the original audience was composed of students at two women's colleges in Cambridge- and published as a book in 1929. Woolf begins by explaining that she has been asked to speak on the topic of "Women and Fiction." After poking fun at this assignment, she quickly shifts ground, asking what a woman needs- what she must have- in order to become a writer. Her answer is now famous: a room of one's own and five hundred pounds a year. As Woolf moves on, she shows that privacy and economic independence have almost always been denied to women, considering historical examples from Aphra Behn to Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte. Her concluding image of the "androgynous mind" is both inspiring and curious. It's worth pointing out the many ways in which this book has encouraged other writers: even today, there are many online blogs that borrow Woolf's title or use a quotation from A Room as a heading or epigraph.
Author
Virginia Woolf (1882-1941). British writer and essayist known best for her "stream of consciousness" style of writing. Born in London, she was the daughter of Leslie and Julia Stephen. Her father was a prominent man of letters, and she grew up in a house full of books. Her mother died when she was only thirteen, and that event was followed closely by the death of her half-sister. Her father died when she was twenty-two, and only a few years later her brother Thoby passed away as well. These events proved traumatic, perhaps not surprisingly, and they contributed to her later struggles with depression. It is said that her fear of a massive breakdown, one from which she could not recover, drove her to commit suicide in 1941. During her lifetime, Woolf was a member of the Bloomsbury Group, which encouraged her writing ambitions. She married Leonard Woolf in 1912 and with him founded the Hogarth Press, which published her works. Her most famous works are Mrs. Dalloway (1925), To the Lighthouse (1927) and A Room of One's Own (1929).
Discussion questions
- Is Woolf right to say that writers need both privacy and money in order to do their work? If so, is that true for both men and women? If so, then how likely is it that writers of both sexes will be able to get what they need?
- How would you update Woolf's arguments? Do today's writers need something more than the room and the money? How about a technology-free space or a silenced cell phone?
- Why does Woolf think that anger is a barrier to women's writing- and indeed, to all writing? Can anger ever be useful to writing? Has it been useful to women in their quest for political and social equality? Would you describe Woolf as angry- and if so, is that necessarily a bad thing?
- The audience for Woolf's original lectures was composed solely of women. How, then, does she deal with the fact that some of the readers of her book will be men? Does she seem to care what male readers will think? Does she ever seem eager to insult or provoke male readers? What does she do to get some of those readers on her side?
- What are we to make of Shakespeare's sister? Does the use of fictional, imaginary examples strengthen or weaken Woolf's case? Would it make more sense for her to stick strictly to the facts?
- What does Woolf mean by her phrases "man-womanly" and "woman-manly"? Are they synonymous with "androgynous"? Do people today, especially writers, need to be more "man-womanly" and "woman-manly"? Have we achieved Woolf's goals, in other words, or is that finally impossible?
- Have women achieved equality? What about in the area of literature? Do women and men enjoy the same opportunities to write and to think? What is the current status of feminism? Does it remain useful? Is it time for a feminist revival- and if not, why not?
Lectures
This lecture by Professor Karen Hoffmann, a Lawrence graduate from the class of 1987, was given in the fall of 2006. The lecture begins with biographical material and goes on to compare Woolf to other modernist writers. In addition, the lecture considers Woolf's decision to remove herself from A Room- the speaker is not Woolf, but a fictional persona of sorts- and analyzes her views on the issues of economic freedom and education for women.
http://www.lawrence.edu/dept/freshman_studies/lectures/0607/woolf.shtml
Visit the link below for all Freshman Studies lectures for the past ten years, including several on Woolf.
http://www.lawrence.edu/dept/freshman_studies/lectures/
Links
- Curious about the Bloomsbury Group? This site is a good place to start.
http://therem.net/bloom.htm - Eager to hear more from Woolf? This wonderful recording, taken from a 1937 broadcast on the BBC, lets you do it.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/audiointerviews/profilepages/woolfv1.shtml - Interestingly, there is a bookstore in Madison, WI, named A Room of One's Own Feminist Bookstore & Coffeehouse. Why not meet there? The bookstore is also home to a foundation that provides programming for women and girls.
http://www.roomofonesown.com/NASApp/store/IndexJsp - Want to read more about feminism? These are lists of new and old favorites.
http://roomofonesown.com/NASApp/store/IndexJsp?s=regionalcatalog