A Room of One's Own is literary essay by Virginia Woolf. This essay, first published on 24 October 1929, was based on a series of lectures she delivered at Newnham College and Girton College, two women' colleges at Cambridge University in October 1928. In the essay, Woolf advances that a woman must have a room of her room if she is to write something. To illustrate her point and reconstruct the existence of women, the author proposes the imaginary figure of Shakespeare’s sister, Judith describing her unpleasant situation and showing the social discrimination against women in the Elizabethan England. The essay is generally seen as a feminist text and is noted in its argument for both a literal and figurative space for women writers within a
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The essay solves the problems that past and current women writers face. Woolf points out that women should have the opportunity for education as boys and lets her audience know the importance of their education at the same time warning them of the precariousness of their position in society. Secondly, the relationship between men and women. Woolf argued that they should be equal in society, and endeavored to search for equality between them. She talked about women’ position in fiction and in real life. From her description, we come to realize that women must obey the will of their parents; otherwise, they would be punished. And money is very important for her, and has changed her life completely. Thirdly, a history of women’ writing. In the essay, Woolf constructs a critical and historical account of women writers thus far. Woolf examines the careers of several female authors, including Aphra Behn, Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters, Anne Finch, Countess of Winchilsea, and George Eliot. In addition to female authors, Woolf also discusses and draws inspiration from noted scholar and feminist Jane Ellen Harrison. Finally, Lesbianism. In another section, describing the work of a fictional woman …show more content…
Firstly, the narrator of the work is at one point identified as "Mary Beaton, Mary Seton, or Mary Carmichael", alluding to the sixteenth century ballad Mary Hamilton. In referencing the tale of a woman about to be hanged for existing outside of marriage and rejecting motherhood, the narrator identifies women writers such as herself as outsiders who exist in a potentially dangerous space. Like the woman in the Four Marys, she is pregnant and trapped in a life imposed on her. Woolf sees Judith Shakespeare, Mary Beaton, Mary Seton, Mary Carmichael, as powerless, impoverished women everywhere as threatened by the spectre of death. She tells the reader to call her “Mary Beton, Mary Seton, Mary Carmichael or any other name you please. The narrator emphasizes that her words apply to all women, not just
The essay solves the problems that past and current women writers face. Woolf points out that women should have the opportunity for education as boys and lets her audience know the importance of their education at the same time warning them of the precariousness of their position in society. Secondly, the relationship between men and women. Woolf argued that they should be equal in society, and endeavored to search for equality between them. She talked about women’ position in fiction and in real life. From her description, we come to realize that women must obey the will of their parents; otherwise, they would be punished. And money is very important for her, and has changed her life completely. Thirdly, a history of women’ writing. In the essay, Woolf constructs a critical and historical account of women writers thus far. Woolf examines the careers of several female authors, including Aphra Behn, Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters, Anne Finch, Countess of Winchilsea, and George Eliot. In addition to female authors, Woolf also discusses and draws inspiration from noted scholar and feminist Jane Ellen Harrison. Finally, Lesbianism. In another section, describing the work of a fictional woman …show more content…
Firstly, the narrator of the work is at one point identified as "Mary Beaton, Mary Seton, or Mary Carmichael", alluding to the sixteenth century ballad Mary Hamilton. In referencing the tale of a woman about to be hanged for existing outside of marriage and rejecting motherhood, the narrator identifies women writers such as herself as outsiders who exist in a potentially dangerous space. Like the woman in the Four Marys, she is pregnant and trapped in a life imposed on her. Woolf sees Judith Shakespeare, Mary Beaton, Mary Seton, Mary Carmichael, as powerless, impoverished women everywhere as threatened by the spectre of death. She tells the reader to call her “Mary Beton, Mary Seton, Mary Carmichael or any other name you please. The narrator emphasizes that her words apply to all women, not just