How Did Judith Have To Die?

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Recommended: Summary of Shakespeare s sister by Virginia Woolf

The story of Judith in Virginia Woolf’s Shakespeare’s Sister is very simple. A girl gone crazy by her own talent runs away from home, fails to achieve her dream, and suicides. However, the termination of the story seems a bit extreme, almost to the point of Korean morning drama. Why did Judith have to die? The ending is greatly intertwined with Woolf’s emotions and life. To begin with, Woolf’s unstable emotions are present in the essay. It is well known that she suffered from mood swings and severe bouts of deep depression. At the age of 6, she was profoundly traumatized by the sexual abuse of her half-brothers George and Gerald Duckworth. The memory of abuse haunted her till death. In her 50s, she wrote in her letter that she still shivers …show more content…

Woolf was victimized by the Victorian beliefs regarding childhood education and discipline, the treatment her sister received by the family, her parents' disregard. (1) The Victorian society had a contradicting belief that children were innocent but wanton and that harsh punishment was necessary. (1) These beliefs strongly influenced parental discipline in Virginia's family. For example, her sister Laura was punished harshly and oppressively by her parents for being slow in learning. Laura was isolated from the family for rest of her life. (1) According to Lee Marsh, it is assumed that Virginia lived with the fear that she could also be isolated after witnessing the solitary confinement of Laura. Moreover, her parents took no interest in her. Her father, overwhelmed by his work as an editor of the Dictionary of National Bibliography, did not pay any attention to his daughter. He eventually became severely depressed and suicidal. (1) Her mother preferred the boys over the girls. While her brothers Adrian and Julian Thoby had given the opportunity to be educated at Cambridge, she had to stay at home. This led Woolf to read and write compulsively to compensate for the fact that she did not get “a real education”.

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