Notes 1/30

A Room of One's Own
by Virginia Woolf

Woolf asks 'Why hasn't there been a female Shakespeare?' She does on to answer her own question. Woolf declares that even if a woman had the same ability and creativity, she would not be able to take advantage of such qualities because writing and publishing were not within their social role. Furthermore, women did not have the same educational opportunities as men, and women weren't allowed to act on stage until the Restoration in 1660. Writing was also looked down upon because it was seen as a way for women to be around men, which was very improper at the time. Woolf even does so far as to tell her imagined tale of of Judith Shakespeare (William's sister) and how her desire to write and act led to her destruction.

Is it important to be a feminist in writing?
Woolf says that no one should write with a chip on his/her shoulder. Women are forced back into thinking about themselves and defining themselves as women; in her essay, she talks about being told to stay off the grass and stay out of the library because women were not allowed in those places. The ability to be an objective intellectual is made difficult because we are constantly being called back into the associations of our bodies. Men, however, are writing like men because they want to keep women as inferior subjects (they are feeling insecure because of the Women's Movement). And according to Woolf, being self-conscious about your sex makes you a lousy writer. Thus, ALL people (men and women alike) who write self-consciously of their sex are part of the problem. Woolf says that Shakespeare was such a great writer because he was neither a man nor a woman, and wrote as neither a man nor a woman.