A Room of One's Own (Annotated)

Description

Reviews

Rating: 4 / 5
Date: 2010-08-05
Summary: "Great for female writers and those who love/live with them"

Familiar with Virginia Woolf only from reputation, I picked up a copy of this book at an antique store. It sat on my nightstand for over a year before I opened the very short essay. Written almost 100 years ago, I related so well to her words, it's one of the few books I know I'll read again, and again. I've actually underlined sections - something I never do! Great for female writers and those who love them.

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2009-09-20
Summary: "Brilliant Essay On Women"

There is no mistaking Woolf's writing style: intricate, introspective, convoluted and then again portraying ideas and situations with brilliant clarity and insight. She ponders the plight of women during her time and through history. Her main question asks why women, despite even those with exceptional talents of intelligence and character, have been abused and dominated by men and relegated to roles as mothers and servants to the men around them. Why are there not great female financiers, writers, academics, etc.? Or why are there too few of them? She searches in many corners such as history books and makes deplorable discoveries: early teen marriages, beatings, restrictions of all sorts, and despicable opinions of women in general by academics and men in other stations. In one instance she compares the plight of Shakespeare and his sister, both equally talented, and you can imagine the results. Her musings are gripping and interesting and at the same time she paints the quality of her physical surroundings quite vividly. This is a favorite book.

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2009-05-11
Summary: "I really liked this item"

The product is fine, but the sipping was a little slow. Very nice book, new, in good conditions. The communication with the store was fine.

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2008-10-24
Summary: "Gubar & Woolf: an excellent combination"

Susan Gubar writes the excellent introduction to this lovely annotated version of Woolf's A Room of One's Own. Even those who have read this book before will enjoy reading a scholarly annotated edition--the notes and introduction provide valuable insight into Woolf's life and times, and the specific conditions against which she rebelled.

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2008-08-15
Summary: "Beauty of logic and written word"

This book is very short and it expresses brilliant logic that I have not seen for a while. Virginia Wolf writes her case about women and writing. What it takes to be a woman artist and remain one. She argues very carefully, that woman artist needs means (read: money) and a room of her own where she can express herself without any interruptions from the outside world. While many male counterparts of her times argue that women have no character and are inferior to men, Virginia asks question on how come that almost two tousand years ago, Greeks were writing literary work that described women like: Cleopatra, Medea, Clytemnestra and Electra? These powerful female images have no characted and power? Anyone who read classics knows it is far from that. Virgina also argues from the works of early British female writers such as: Lady Winchilsea, Margaret Newcastle and Aphra Behn, that finest poetry was created by a women of noble birth married into a noble families. These women were educated, cultured, most had no children and had very understanding and supportive husbands or were single. They were lonely creatures who produced valuable work. Women of lower birth and less education, such as Jane Austen and Bronte sisters, were talented, but they wrote about the world they new about: middle class that was all around them. They were social observers who wrote in the crowded living rooms about people that were part of their own world. In addition, they did not produce poems, they produced novels primarily. Virginia argues that only the most perceptive of women are capable of producing remarkable poetry. She also draws similarity that it was male writers from the upper classes that created masterpieces. The exception was Keats, who was poor but who also dies young - since writing is exhausting both physically and emotionally. But she also argues that the finest of male voices who dedicated their lives to writing has sort of sensitivity that is unique to women. So the true writer is never he or she, it is a mix of both sexes. This is one of the most powerful feminist books I have ever read and I admire Virginia Woolf for having a courage to create it and share it with the public.