Room of One\'s Own by Virginia Woolf Found in the Seagull Reader

Virginia Woolf

In "A Room of One's Own," Virginia Woolf argues that writing is a means by which women can empower themselves, and in so doing, subvert patriarchy. Woolf uses symbolism throughout the essay, namely in the central concept of a room. A room, or a physical space, provides the power of place from which to launch probing inquiry and social commentary. Rather than dwell inside the confines of a patriarchal, pre-defined social space, the woman creates a room of her own. This room is both a public and a private sphere; it is a room in the sense of having one's privacy. It is also a room to speak in a public forum, which Woolf does when she delivers the essay. Woolf speaks on behalf of all women, which is one of her rhetorical strategies. Specific literary techniques other than symbolism, such as irony, add depth to Woolf's argument. The author also draws from Aristotelian rhetorical strategies using pathos, ethos, and logos to underscore the underrepresentation of women in literature, politics, and history. By showing that the personal is the collective, and the private is the political, Virginia Woolf presents a powerful social justice polemic.

One of Woolf's literary techniques that becomes a rhetorical strategy is irony, and she uses irony in several different ways in "A Room of One's Own." For example, in Chapter One, Woolf writes, "call me Mary Beton, Mary Seton, Mary Carmichael or by any name you please -- it is not a matter of any importance." Here, the author plays on the patriarchal subjugation of women by denigrating their independence and individuality. The stereotypes that underlie gender bias and sexism undermine self-expression. When Woolf makes this statement, she also makes a coy allusion to the prevailing belief that "all women" are the same, and are of a certain (low) intellectual, spiritual, and political capacity. At the same time, Woolf understands the rhetorical power and opportunity in capitalizing on this stereotype and owning it. Woolf wants her audience to find a common bond, and to reach a mutual understanding about the pitfalls of patriarchy. It does not matter if Virginia Woolf is Mary Beton or Mary Seton; what matters is that no matter what the woman's name, or where she is from, she has lived and contended with patriarchal social structures and hierarchies.

Whereas Woolf self-consciously creates the irony in her blanket statement about "all" women, the author also points out the more sinister irony embedded in the patriarchal worldview. In particular, Woolf notes in Chapter 2: "Are you aware that you are, perhaps, the most discussed animal in the universe?" The irony here is that, while women are excluded from the public sphere and the domain of political and economic power, women are subjects of tremendous fascination for men. Men have a dichotomous relationship with the woman: at once trapping and silencing her, and also venerating and worshipping her as some great mystery. Yet rather than asking a woman what she thinks, or to have a woman write her own history, the patriarchal person condescendingly creates a one-sided version of events. As Woolf puts it, "She pervades poetry from cover to cover; she is all but absent from history. She dominates the lives of kings and conquerors in fiction; in fact she was the slave of any boy whose parents forced a ring upon her finger," (Chapter 3).

In addition to irony, Woolf uses symbolism to convey her central ideas. Woolf reveals that having a room of one's own represents a radical step, because it subverts the entire foundation of the patriarchal social structure. The lack of personal space has a distinct political component to it. "If a woman wrote, she would have to write in the common sitting-room," Woolf points out (Chapter 4). There was no legitimacy to what women thought, and what women did, they did in the service of men's needs. This has led to practical implications such as the economic dependency of women on men; which is why a woman has no private space. Disallowed from owning property, the man owns the means by which to create.