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A Room Of One's Own
In her essay, A Room of One’s Own, Virginia Woolf states that “a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.”
While the statement was undoubtedly true when she wrote it back in 1929, women are in a much different position today then they were then. Women now attend universities, run corporations, are Heads of State, and marry later in life, if at all. In short, women have choices now that weren’t available to them back in Virginia Woolf’s day. For one thing, money is easier to obtain. Women are no longer dependent on the goodwill of their fathers or husbands. Instead, women can earn their own living. While it would be lovely to have some distant relative will you a tidy income, it’s not necessary.
But one fact still remains true—a woman must have time and space in order to write. However, I hazard to guess that my idea of time and space would differ greatly from Ms. Woolf’s. Perhaps that’s because I’m much more pragmatic in nature. Or perhaps it’s because I’m not writing a great literary work of art, but a romance novel. Who knows? What I do know is that thousands, nay hundreds of thousands, of women write works of fiction each and every year, all while earning a living, raising their children, and having a life.
Women write on the bus, in the car while they are waiting to pick up their children at school, and while they wait at the doctor’s office. They write when their children go to bed at night or before they awake in the morning. They scribble furiously on their lunch breaks or on day’s off while waiting for the laundry to finish spinning. They are inundated by phone calls, emails, meetings and deadlines. Women seem to have less time alone than ever before, still, they have learned to carve out bits and pieces of time to write because the act of writing means so much to them.
As for a space of one’s own, it may be something as elaborate as an office with an actual door that closes, a corner of another room with a desk, or simply a laptop or a pad and pen. What matters is the act of writing.
I think the difference between now and when Virginia Woolf first penned her essay is the attitude of women as a whole, and therefore society in general. Women can do whatever they choose to do today. Their options are limited only by their imaginations. While I’m not naïve enough to believe these attitudes exist everywhere, and certainly not in all countries of the world, the fact remains that women’s voices are being heard. Whether it’s a biography, a work of non-fiction, a literary work, a mystery, a tale of science fiction, or yes, a romance novel, women are putting pen to paper, or fingers to keyboards and tapping out their stories, one stroke at a time.
Even back in Virginia’s day women were stealing moments of time to put their words down on paper. Sure, not many of them published novels (or certainly not as many as today), but that doesn’t mean they didn’t write in their diaries or journals. They wrote the tales of their lives, letting them unfold one page at a time, listing births and deaths and other important moments that marked their existence. They shared recipes and wrote letters. Perhaps they passed these journals or letters with their kernels of wisdom on to their children, or maybe they were locked away in a trunk in dusty attic, rotten and forgotten.
No matter. What does matter is the act of writing, the act of creating something where there was nothing. Very little written today will be remembered, or indeed matter, to future generations. Does that devalue what is being written? Not at all. At least in my humble opinion.
The need to write is what drives the writer. It’s what drives me to sit at my desk, my chair tight against the wall, tucked away in the corner of my living room. A screen gives me the illusion of privacy and I’ve decorated the wall next to my desk in a way that pleases me. This is my space and now is my time. By sitting here and typing this blog entry I am stating that I am a writer. I make my own living and have carved out my own space.
One wonders what Virginia Woolf would have done if she’d been born sixty or seventy years later.
Great post, NJ! I think Virginia would have loved the freedom of being able to write everywhere she pleased.
For some reason, when I started reading your post, a fictional character popped into my head. She’s the woman in Henrik Isben’s play, “A Doll’s House.” I can’t recall her name. She wasn’t a writer but helped her husband with his business. She didn’t receive the respect she deserved.
I’m so glad things have changed and women feel free to do whatever they want. Fortunately, we’re seeing more women in leadership roles in so many careers, but men are many times still paid more than women doing the same jobs. This has always been a source of great irritation to me. The excuse is that a man is considered the main provider for a family.
You’re right. The space one needs is in one’s heart and soul. She wrote at a time when it was practically revolutionary to insinuate a woman deserved a space of her own, whether internal or external. Her statements were metaphorical and still resonate. Men and women can overdo—march to the beat of a rat race with no end.
Women have a lot more freedom now, Diane, but we still have a ways to go!
The space in one’s heart and soul is the most important, Ciar. A lot of women still have a hard time believing that they deserve space of their own.
“The need to write is what drives the writer. It’s what drives me to sit at my desk…”
I think this everyday. Nice post N.J. :-)
Dear N.J.,
A long time ago, I decided that I would read for pleasure only and not because someone told me that I had to read this novel or that novel, this essay or that essay,etc. It’s really too bad that Virginia Woolf found her room because I could never stomach her works. On the other hand, you are eminantly readable. I think you found a better room!
Bev Stephans
What a wonderful post, NJ! My mother was born in 1918, and she wanted nothing more than to be a journalist and work in a newspaper office. Her father was a newspaper editor and traveled from town to town in California publishing newspapers. As she grow into young womanhood, she studied and even worked with him. She published the newspaper for the college in Salinas while she attended. When push came to shove, however, her father said in no way was any daughter of his going to work in a newspaper office! She could be a teacher, a beautician, or get married. She got married.
She raised four children and turned her pen toward many pursuits—she did newsletters for PTAs, she wrote scripts for follies to raise funds for charities, she wrote poetry…she wrote. She may not have been able to achieve her dream of being a newspaper editor, and yet the need to express life through writing continues to this day. She found her mother’s diary, and through the tales of birth, death, and day-to-day ponderings, she began to piece together the story of her family. Now she furiously puts pen to paper, fingers to keyboard, and publishes yearly books for the family so we can remember where we came from. A writer will write weather they publish a novel or simply pen their thoughts, their hopes, and their dreams—gems for future generations.
I’m going to “me too” off of TK’s post. Writing expression for my mother, born in 1914, also included letters to her twelve brothers and sisters. The letters have not survived the years, but the unpublished author had a lively “:conversation” with her correspondants. When was the last time I sat down and hand wrote a letter to anyone? Not since the computer, within my budget, became available. That machinery allows so many of us an easier task of writing than pounding out 400 pages of manuscript using carbon paper on a manual typewriter.Holy crap, that was a job, one mistake and you got the fun of correcting that many copies by hand, no delete key. Technology has made writing easier for many women, not just the freeing of society’s restrictions.
Thanks, Brenda. :-)
Thank you for the compliment, Bev. I think that we all have authors we like and some that we dislike. I think Virginia Woolf, like most of us, wrote out of her own experience.
Your mother sounds like an amazing woman, TK. What she is doing for her family is invaluable. I’m sure that the act of writing itself is a great pleasure for her or she wouldn’t spend so much time involved in these activities. I wish someone in my family had done something like this. Much of the family history is lost as the older generation passes on.
Technology has it good points and bad points, Jackie. As you said, fixing mistakes at the touch of a button is a godsend. However, the art of letter writing is all but lost. Not many folks send letters anymore, not with the convenience of email. That’s sad in many ways. I remember when receiving a letter in the mail was an exciting thing.
Great, thought provoking post, NJ! To a large degree, I think many of us, or others we are close to, still put limits on what we can do. My father pushed me into taking typing classes all through school. In his mind, if a woman could type then she could get a job working in an office and support herself. Knowing he wouldn’t always be here for me, he wanted me to be able to provide for myself. For many years, I listened and believed that was all I could do, even though I hated office work and had different dreams.
It wasn’t until after my father passed away that I began looking into doing something that made me happy. I pushed past his teachings and went to college <gasp> obtaining not one, but three degrees. Now I work in a medical career which fulfills my need to help others. My writing has always been for me, giving voice to those pesky characters roaming around in my mind. Having my stories published for the enjoyment of others is icing on the cake.
I think many women of our generation faced the same thing, Lauren. A woman could work in an office, be a nurse or a teacher. Those were the top three jobs.
I took a clerktyping course, which I’m grateful for now. LOL I hated office work though, and ended up in retail management for years. I enjoyed the variety in my days. Now I enjoy writing every day.
It’s good that you found the courage to go back to school and then find a career that you find fulfilling. That’s the key. And it doesn’t have to be just one thing. You have two careers!
ACK! Nic, I didn’t mean to call you Lauren!
I just answered an email from her so she was still on my mind. g
I haven’t had a room of my own to write in yet and it doesn’t really seem to be slowing me down. All you need is a spot to work, and it doesn’t have to be the same spot. In fact, there may be something to say for changing locations. I would like to have a real office some day and not a desk in the dining room, but in the meantime the room I really need is that place inside my head where stories live. g
I’ve never had a room of my own either, Charli. It would be cool to have a real room with a door, but my corner of the living room works fine for me.
You’re absolutely right when you say that the only place you need is the place inside your head where your stories live. I, for one, am glad that not having a room of your own hasn’t slowed you down at all!
beautifully written NJ!
I first started writing when I had four boys under four. I would literally keep the computer on all day – and would dash over and write just a word, or a phrase, or a sentence – whatever I could squeeze in between all the demands of domestic chaos – and slowly, slowly get stuff out that way.
I think I’ve become used to writing amidst noise and chaos and now, when the boys are all at school and/or childcare and I have the house to myself, I find it hard to sit down and write for big chunks of time.
(but that could have something to do with the distraction of the net)
It’s amazing how you can get used to just about anything, Rebecca.
I read somewhere that Virginia Henley wrote her first novels by hand sitting at the coffee table in her livingroom with her husband, son and father all watching television.
Great post N.J.
I found gaining a room of my own was one of the elements that helped me create my second book. I’m lucky, I have a large rambling two family. We cleared a tiny parlor at the head of the stairs. It still has the capped feed for the gas light. I did it not because of Wolfe, but because of what Stephen King had written in his book: basically advocating to have a place where the muse can come, even if the muse is a dude who smokes cigars. I finished my first book at my kitchen table, but somehow, when in my head I made the commitment to clear the room, and then in my world created that carved out space, the muse realized it was rubber hit the road time and the second book came together far more readily. I’d feel the world fade away as I stepped into the tiny space, and it was so easy to just dip into my book. Though every once in a while I still found myself down in my kitchen, as if to refresh or re-affirm the sanctity of the upstairs. Interestingly enough, it was book two that was published. So I’m committed to the room theory, or at least a sepcial corner of the world.
That’s wonderful, Ursula.
It is important to find a space of your own, no matter where it is. My tiny corner of the living room works for me. When I sit at my desk, I know it’s time to work. I don’t do anything else there but write.
It’s wonderful to have a space and I’m glad you found yours.