Virginia Woolf (1882 – 1941), a prominent English writer and feminist, was considered one of the twentieth-century’s most remarkable modernist novelists. The well-known works of Virginia Woolf are often closely related to the development of feminist reproach. With that being said, she was a rather distinguished writer in relation to the modernist movement as well. Virginia Woolf certainly restructured the novel, experimenting with her flow of thoughts and imageries. Although, not always appearing to be the work of clear organization or even solid structure for that matter. This allowed her to portray the inner lives (emotional and psychological motives) of her characters through an element of familiarity.
During the course of her life, Virginia Woolf endured severe fits of mental illness, believed to have been the effect of what is typically characterized as bipolar disorder. While her fairly unique style of writing was largely influenced by way of the symptoms she experienced though her disorder, those same symptoms likewise triggered horrible mood swings. This behavior repeatedly led to periods of recuperation in her home which caused her imagination and ingenuity to be compromised in relation to her writing.
Throughout her lifetime, Virginia Woolf wrote nine novels: The Voyage Out, Orlando, To the Lighthouse, Mrs. Dalloway, Jacob’s Room, Night and Day, The Years, The Waves and Between the Acts. In addition to novels, she wrote many pieces of non-fiction as well: The Death of the Moth and Other Essays, Women and Writing and A Room of One's Own.
With that being said, A Room of One's Own (1929), a book-length essay, is regarded by most as one of Virginia Woolf’s most famous pieces (in terms of criticism and feminist literary). ...
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...e literary world in relation to its conventions concerning women writers, her feminism, which consist not just of her obvious feminist politics but her captivation and concern with gender characteristics, molded her writing greatly. This, in turn, contributed greatly to the contemporary feminism of her time as she took personal experiences in life and used them as an inspiration throughout her writing. With that being said, perhaps her single most important work of feminist literary criticism, A Room of One's Own contributed most as it explores the circumstantial and historic possibilities and personal experiences of Virginia Woolf concerning contemporary feminism and literary achievement.
Works Cited
Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own. eBooks@Adelaide. 4 Mar. 2014. Web. 7 Apr. 2014.
Woolf, Virginia. “Virginia Wolf.” The Literature Network. 7 April 2014. Web.
Why would I start with Julia Duckworth Stephen to get to Virginia Woolf? One answer is Virginia’s often quoted statement that "we think back through our mothers if we are women" (Woolf, A Room of One’s Own). Feminism is rooted not just in a response to patriarchy but also in the history of females and their treatment of each other. Part of feminism is a reevaluation of the value of motherhood.
Throughout Virginia Woolf’s writings, she describes two different dinners: one at a men’s college, and another at a women’s college. Using multiple devices, Woolf expresses her opinion of the inequality between men and women within these two passages. She also uses a narrative style to express her opinions even more throughout the passages.
Virginia Woolf is not unlike any other truly good artist: her writing is vague, her expression can be inhibited, and much of her work is up to interpretation from the spectator. Jacob’s Room is one of her novels that can be hard to digest, but this is where the beauty of the story can be found. It is not written in the blatant style of the authors before her chose and even writers today mimic, but rather Jacob’s Room appears more like a written painting than a book. It is as if Woolf appeared tired and bored of the black and white style of writing that dominated her culture and chose to use a paintbrush to write her story. This individualistic technique is essential to how Woolf creates a portrait of Jacob, the title character of the novel. The portrait the reader gets of Jacob is entirely questionable throughout the entire story, just like any understanding of a human in life is more about opinion than fact. This is how Woolf captures life, the reader’s view of Jacob is almost completely based on interpretations from other characters. These various assessments of Jacob form together to make the collective portrait of Jacob. Woolf states that “Multiplicity becomes unity, which somehow the secret of life” (147), the secret of the novel as well.
Woolf, Virginia. "A Room of One's Own." The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Ed. M.H. Abrams et al. 7th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2000. 2153-2214.
Female Identity in Virginia Woolf’s, To The Lighthouse, Elizabeth Bowen’s, Heat of the Day and Iris Murdoch’s, Under the Net
Virginia Woolf, in her novels, set out to portray the self and the limits associated with it. She wanted the reader to understand time and how the characters could be caught within it. She felt that time could be transcended, even if it was momentarily, by one becoming involved with their work, art, a place, or someone else. She felt that her works provided a change from the typical egotistical work of males during her time, she makes it clear that women do not posses this trait. Woolf did not believe that women could influence as men through ego, yet she did feel [and portray] that certain men do hold the characteristics of women, such as respect for others and the ability to understand many experiences. Virginia Woolf made many of her time realize that traditional literature was no longer good enough and valid. She caused many women to become interested in writing, and can be seen as greatly influential in literary history
How can one establish one’s own personal identity when one’s societal expectations rules one’s life? Virginia Woolf uses her story, A Room of One’s Own, to show the stifling reality of the struggles in making room for women in the twentieth century culture. Virginia Woolf established a feministic view in the patriarchal world of the early 1900s. Woolf begins the story with a witty narrator preparing a lecture on women and fiction, and that the reality for a female to write fiction was not conducive to the weary life handed to her. The narrator of A Room of One’s Own points out that the cultural expectations for women in society was quite different from what many women’s goals actually were in life.
Blackstone, Bernard. Virginia Woolf: A Commentary. London: Hogarth Press, 1949. (An older but excellent essay.)
feminism is in actuality quite limited in tha t she only applies it to British, upper middleclass women writers. Virginia Woolf’s essay-which to Bennett seemed non- feminist and to Daiches seemed feminist- universalist-is, by our modern definition, feminist; however, the borders of culture, class, and profession that composed her frame of reference drastically limit the scope of Woolf’s feminism.
Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own. New York: Harcourt Brace & Company, 1929. Print.
Transue, Pamela J. Virginia Woolf and the Politics of Style. Albany: State U of New York P, 1986.
Throughout history, women writers used pen names and pseudonyms to avoid the eyes of the patriarchal society. The female writers were no strangers to harsh criticism from the gender-biased readers regarding their artistic works. However such emphasis on gender discrimination coined the words, feminism and sexism, which now reflect on the past and the present conflicts. In the book A Room Of One’s Own, Virginia Woolf tracks down the history of women and fiction to find the answer. She argues, “A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction”. She chants on and on about the topic of “women and fiction”, contemplating the role of women in the traditional domain and the virtues of women writers. Although, Woolf may have contemplated over such awareness that a woman needs an atmosphere of her own in which nobody can intrude, the modern world has prevailed over such hindrances throughout technological innovations that offer freedom of speech. Also, economical affluence is not a necessity for women to engage in the fictional world but rather a sufficient condition in the modern world. Thus Virginia Woolf’s predictions failed to represent the current vantage point revolving around women and fiction.
In the Broadview Anthropology of Expository Prose, Buzzard et al. describe Virginia Woolf’s essay “Professions for Women” as a “lecture to a society of professional women” (100). As a queer writer, Woolf’s voice during the 1930’s received much attention, along with praise and criticism. Woolf’s fight for women’s empowerment and gender equality are evident throughout her essay, and as of now, in the 21st century, it is unequivocal that Woolf saw herself as a feminist. However, as Woolf writes her “Professions for women” she makes use of the blanket terms “the woman” and “herself” to refer to a general professional woman. It leads us to question who the woman really is: which kinds of individuals are included in and excluded from Woolf’s filtered view of women. How does
Virginia Woolf’s eccentric style is what causes her writings to be distinct from other authors of her time. The unique characteristics of her works such as the structure, characterization, themes, etc are difficult to imitate and cause a strong impression in her literary pieces. “Virginia Woolf’s works are strongly idiosyncratic, strange, a surprise to ...
Many female writers see themselves as advocates for other creative females to help find their voice as a woman. Although this may be true, writer Virginia Woolf made her life mission to help women find their voice as a writer, no gender attached. She believed women had the creativity and power to write, not better than men, but as equals. Yet throughout history, women have been neglected in a sense, and Woolf attempted to find them. In her essay, A Room of One’s Own, she focuses on what is meant by connecting the terms, women and fiction. Woolf divided this thought into three categories: what women are like throughout history, women and the fiction they write, and women and the fiction written about them. When one thinks of women and fiction, what they think of; Woolf tried to answer this question through the discovery of the female within literature in her writing.