A review by marissasa
A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf

challenging hopeful informative reflective slow-paced

3.0

Although nothing groundbreaking and nothing I haven't heard before, I do try to read and appreciate having read about feminism and the ways in which women have to navigate the patriarchal society that we have been confined to. This set of essays from Woolf gave me insight into what being a female author in the 1920s and earlier was like, surrounded by nothing but praise and acclaim for male writers like Shakespeare and Tolstoy whose works focused on typically masculine interests like war and sport, while women were not just looked down upon for pursuing literature but actively barred from entry into the field due to the lack of resources, education, money, and ability - hence the need for a room of one's own. It also gave me insight into the values of Woolf herself, and in her acknowledgment that the everyday lives of average women were largely unrecorded because they were not as relevant to the male writers of the time. From her enjoyment and recording of the small activities and things she sees as she goes about her day while thinking about what to say on women and fiction, to the idea that people's differences including their gender identities have great value because they contribute to the sum of human experiences in the world, I could see why she wrote Mrs. Dalloway and why she stresses the importance of being true to oneself more than anything else in both writing and in life. 
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