Gabriela Grimaldi
Ms. Smith
AP Literature
4 March 2014
Virginia Woolf on Attaining Female Genius in the Victorian Era
"So it is naturally with the male and the female; the one is superior, the other inferior; the one governs, the other is governed; and the same rule must necessarily hold good with respect to all mankind." Aristotle’s quote rings especially true in reference to the Victorian Era. In the late 1800s and early 1900s men were considered the dominant of the two sexes. Because of this, “For most of history, Anonymous was a woman” (Woolf 51). Female genius was undistinguished or nonexistent in the century in which Virginia Woolf lived, because it was completely and utterly dominated by males. Her surroundings influenced her to explore the history of women in literature through an unconventional examination of the social and material circumstances necessary for the process of writing. Virginia Woolf asserts that female genius cannot be attained in a society that solely praises the masculine desire for status and seniority because it opposes creativity, which is essential to the education and independence of women, which fosters genius.
The Victorian Era perpetually changed the history of literature; ironically, it was also a time period in which men heavily defined the status of women. A woman was at the mercy of her father before marriage and after marriage was dependent on her husband. Woolf asserts through her literature, that men historically belittled women as a means of asserting their own superiority (Roseman). This masculine desire for status and seniority may be exemplified best in a set of Woolf’s extended essays titled, “A Room of One’s Own.” In these essays, Woolf constructs a metaphor of a looking-glass re...
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...ne side to beat another side, and of the utmost importance to walk up to a platform and receive from the hands of the Headmaster himself a highly ornamental pot.” “Women have sat indoors all these millions of years, so that by this time the very walls are permeated by their creative force, which has, indeed, so overcharged the capacity of bricks and mortar that it must needs harness itself to pens and brushes and business and politics.” “There is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind.”
By being deprived of rooms of their own, there is little possibility for women to rectify the situation. Even though this is clearly a historical truth, Woolf’s assertion was revolutionary at its time. It recast the accomplishments of women in a new and far more favorable light, and it also forced people to realize the harsh truths about their society.
Willingly or grudgingly, the women in Woolf and Browning’s works are regulated to the domestic circle, discouraged from the literary world, and are expected to act as foils to their male counterparts. Without the means to secure financial independence, women are confined to the world of domestic duties. In Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, Mary Seton’s “homely” mother is neither a businesswoman nor a magnate on the Stock Exchange. She cannot afford to provide formal education for her daughters or for herself. Without money, the women must toil day and night at home, with no time for conversations about “archaeology, botany, anthropology, physics, the nature of the atom, mathematics, astronomy, relativity, geography” – the subjects of the men’s conversations (26).
Virginia Woolf's inspiring work tries to take on many problems in regard to women's work. She takes into consideration comparisons between women's and men's privilleges. Man's greatest advantages over woman would be their chances and opportunities to succeed and the chance to express themselves. Woolf believes , that wealth and a room of one's own is necessary in order to attain intellectual freedom is incorrect and misleading as it does not take into consideration education, having a good self esteem, access to all resources, not having domestic hindrances. These all inclusive of having wealth is essential for a writer to flourish.
They would both agree that this inequality feeds the other motifs described in their own works, such as: the individuality of truth, the importance of monetary means, or the hatred and ridicule that society directs at women writers. Woolf might not have agreed with all of Stael’s beliefs, but she would find Stael’s views on gender inequality and the causes of these inequalities to contain the essential oil of truth she was desperately searching for. Gender Inequality was what Woolf emphasized as the major downfall of women writers, and Stael shared those views on this subject.... ... middle of paper ...
Mary Wollstonecraft, a writer in the 18th century was a victim of an abusive father. She was also left destitute by a man after falling pregnant. She fell pregnant again with the father unconventionally marrying her but she died after childbirth complications at the age of thirty eight. The events of abuse shaped her life. Mary Wollstonecraft’s most influential writing ‘A Vindication of the Rights of Women’ (1792) discusses how women were treated within a social context. This significant and well-known book was considered one of the earliest writings within the feminist philosophy. This involved the way females were taught to behave. Wollstonecraft’s main idea throughout her writing, looks at the question – “how many generations may be necessary to give vigour to the virtue and talents of the freed prosperity of abject slaves?”, which is still relevant today (Wollstonecraft 1792, p.6). She argues against the ...
"How many million times she had seen her face, and always with the same imperceptible contraction! She pursed her lips when she looked in the glass. It was to give her face point. That was her self-pointed; dartlike; definite. That was her self when some effort, some call on her to be her self, drew the parts together, she alone knew how different, how incompatible and composed so for the world only into one centre, one diamond, one woman who sat in her drawing-room and made a meeting-point, a radiancy no doubt in some dull lives, a refuge for the lonely to come to, perhaps; she had helped young people, who were grateful to her; had tried to be the same always, never showing a sign of all the other sides of her-faults, jealousies, vanities, suspicions, like this of Lady Bruton not asking her to lunch; which, she thought (combing her hair finally), is utterly base! Now, where was her dress?" (37).
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.
During the Victorian Era, society had idealized expectations that all members of their culture were supposedly striving to accomplish. These conditions were partially a result of the development of middle class practices during the “industrial revolution… [which moved] men outside the home… [into] the harsh business and industrial world, [while] women were left in the relatively unvarying and sheltered environments of their homes” (Brannon 161). This division of genders created the ‘Doctrine of Two Spheres’ where men were active in the public Sphere of Influence, and women were limited to the domestic private Sphere of Influence. Both genders endured considerable pressure to conform to the idealized status of becoming either a masculine ‘English Gentleman’ or a feminine ‘True Woman’. The characteristics required women to be “passive, dependent, pure, refined, and delicate; [while] men were active, independent, coarse …strong [and intelligent]” (Brannon 162). Many children's novels utilized these gendere...
Woolf, Virginia. "Chapter Two." A Room of One's Own. N.p.: n.p., n.d. N. pag. Adelaide University. Adelaide University Australia, 9 Feb. 2013. Web. 21 Nov. 2013. .
Although women in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries faced oppression and unequal treatment, some people strove to change common perspectives on the feminine sex. John Stuart Mill, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and Virginia Woolf were able to reach out to the world, through their literature, and help change the views that society held towards women and their roles within its structure. During the Victorian era, women were bound to domestic roles and were very seldom allowed to seek other positions. Most men and many women felt that if women were allowed to pursue interests, outside traditional areas of placement that they would be unable to be an attentive wife and mother. The conventional roles of women were kept in place by long standing values and beliefs that held to a presumption, in which, women were inferior to men in every way. In The Subjection of Women, The Lady of Shalott, and A Room of One's Own, respectively, these authors define their views on the roles women are forced to play in society, and why they are not permitted to step outside those predetermined boundaries.
The suicide seems symptomatic of Woolf's own feelings of oppression within a patriarchal world where only the words of men, it seemed, were taken seriously. Nevertheless, women writers still look to Woolf as a liberating force and, in particular, at A Room of One's Own as an inspiring and empowering work. Woolf biographer Quentin Bell notes that the text argues: the disabilities of women are social and economic; the woman writer can only survive despite great difficulties, and despite the prejudice and the economic selfishness of men; and the key to emancipation is to be found in the door of a room which a woman may call her own and which she can inhabit with the same freedom and independence as her brothers. (144) The.
“Girls wear jeans and cut their hair short and wear shirts and boots because it is okay to be a boy; for a girl it is like promotion. But for a boy to look like a girl is degrading, according to you, because secretly you believe that being a girl is degrading” (McEwan 55-56). Throughout the history of literature women have been viewed as inferior to men, but as time has progressed the idealistic views of how women perceive themselves has changed. In earlier literature women took the role of being the “housewife” or the household caretaker for the family while the men provided for the family. Women were hardly mentioned in the workforce and always held a spot under their husband’s wing. Women were viewed as a calm and caring character in many stories, poems, and novels in the early time period of literature. During the early time period of literature, women who opposed the common role were often times put to shame or viewed as rebels. As literature progresses through the decades and centuries, very little, but noticeable change begins to appear in perspective to the common role of women. Women were more often seen as a main character in a story setting as the literary period advanced. Around the nineteenth century women were beginning to break away from the social norms of society. Society had created a subservient role for women, which did not allow women to stand up for what they believe in. As the role of women in literature evolves, so does their views on the workforce environment and their own independence. Throughout the history of the world, British, and American literature, women have evolved to become more independent, self-reliant, and have learned to emphasize their self-worth.
As previously mentioned, inferiority perceptions and obstacles for women remain prevalent in the twenty-first century. Although substantial progress has been made with regards to the educational opportunities for women, as well as educating both men and women to view women with equal regard, we have yet to achieve parity among genders. In particular, “Contemporary feminists, such as Catherine MacKinnon, argue that the law and society’s political institutions are based on male assumptions, such that women can never achieve equality within them” (Tannenbaum, 2012, p. 220). Additionally, the recent focus on gender socialization directly relates to Wollstonecraft’s writings. In fact, she may be one of the first philosophers to establish the foundation for studying gender socialization through her assertions from two hundred years ago, “the character of women was artificial, and a consequence of the roles society defines for them” (p. 213a). Tannenbaum’s summary of Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women, reads as though it’s from a current Sociology course in gender equality and diversity. “Women are fond of dress and gossip; are helpless, emotional, weak; and act like children, not because it is there nature, but because they are educated or trained this way” (p. 213b). Wollstonecraft’s assertions were revolutionary when taking into account the historical context of her vision. Hence, both genders can benefit from studying her feminist perspective, then contemplating how her vision has evolved over time in society, as well as advocating for its continued
During the gap between the years these stories were released, women were fighting a war for the cause of equality between all genders in regards to voting, equal pay, and fair treatment. Woolf shows in her writing that regardless of the social progress that was made during that time, it was far from over in regards to the way women lived their lives. Woolf’s story sheds light from the point of view of a woman who wants to stray away from the duties of being a stay at home housewife and focus on the life of an artist, or in this case, a writer. Woolf explains in the beginning paragraph of “Killing the Angel in the House” that there have been women to make significant impacts on the world of literature, but so few in comparison to those who were
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. Virginia Woolf Throughout her life Virginia Woolf became increasingly interested in the topic of women and fiction, which is highly reflected in her writing. To understand her piece, A Room of One’s Own Room, her reader must understand her.
As Woolf narrates her essay in first-person, she introduces “the woman” as her subject. Woolf claims that “the woman” is who remains after killing the Angel in the House (102). Now, we may wonder what kind of woman “the woman” is. Woolf answers this question herself by saying, “I assure you, I do not know. I do not believe that you know” (102). Of course, it is clear what Woolf’s uncertainty implies: since women are shaped by the patriarchal society to be nothing but the Angel in the House, once that Angel is killed, we do not know anything of the capabilities, personality, weaknesses, and strengths of the true woman. Although Woolf’s implication is a fair critique of the effects of patriarchy on feminine gender, does Woolf go far enough in such critique as