Lit Theory - Woolf - A Room on One's Own

Virginia Woolf

1.     A Room of One’s Own

a.     Shakespeare’s Sister.

                                               i.     If Shakespeare had a sister that shared his intellect, adventurous spirit and talent, she would:

1.     Not have been educated in the same fashion as Shakespeare.

2.     Not have opportunities for employment or ability to explore her craft.

3.     Have been directed towards “women’s work.”

4.     Have been married off at a young age.

5.     Have eventually killed herself.

                                             ii.     More importantly, it would have been unthinkable for a woman to have the genius of Shakespeare.

                                            iii.     Women were forced work at a young age and held there by custom, law, and tradition.

                                            iv.     Surmises that women must have been born of genius throughout the ages. 

1.     The must have suffered, “gone half crazed” and probably killed themselves.

b.     Chloe Liked Olivia.

                                               i.     Sometimes women like women.  This could be taken in terms of friendship or more intimate relations.

1.     Until the nineteenth century, women were generally portrayed in their relation to men.  Not to other women in terms of friendship.

2.     It becomes clear men know little of women.

3.     A role reversal is suggested in that men are only portrayed as lovers of women without any other relation to men.

a.     There would be little room for men and literature would have suffered.

b.     Literature has been impoverished the same way with the exclusion of women.

4.     Female friendships are an area that has not been explored and would be new material for an author.

5.     It might prove difficult for women to digest as they have been conditioned and suppressed.

c.     Androgyny.

                                               i.     The mind is at its creative best when the fusion of the male and female parts of the brain.

1.     This applies to both men and women.

2.     Both are needed for creation.

                                             ii.     Woolf surmises this is what Coleridge meant by the androgynous mind.  The mind is:

1.     Resonant and porous,

2.     It transmits emotion without impediment,

3.     It is naturally creative,

4.     It is incandescent and undivided.

                                            iii.     Books written by men tend to be:

1.     Reflective of a free mind.

2.     Reflective of a mind able to stretch and grow.

3.     Reflective of a mind that’s never been thwarted.

4.     Reflective of “I,” the projection of the male author’s views.

5.     Boring.

                                            iv.     A writer must write as a womanly-man or a manly-woman in order to produce suggestive material that moves the soul.

1.     Writing as one sex produces immature and pointless characters.

2.     The mind must be balanced, or androgynous to produce material that will nourish the reader.

Works Cited

Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own.  The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism.  Ed. Vincent B. Leitch et al.  2^nd ed. New York: W.W.Norton & Co., 2010. 892-905. Print.