Study Questions & Essay Topics
Study Questions
1. In this highly
materialist argument, to what degree does Woolf leave open the possibility
that an individual genius may rise above such limiting circumstances
as poverty or lack of education?
2. How would you
describe the form of this essay? Is it an argument? If so, how does
it differ from more conventional forms of argumentation, and to
what effect?
3. Woolf claims
that the particular social realities in which women live create
distinctively female values and outlooks. Does she think this is
a good thing or a bad thing?
Suggested Essay Topics
1. What is the role of tradition
in the experience of a women writer? In that of writers in general?
2. What does Woolf say about
the creativity that women have always expressed in non-artistic
ways? (You might want to refer to her portrait of Mrs. Ramsay in To The
Lighthouse, especially in the section "The
Window," Chapters 17-19.)
3. What predictions does Woolf
make for women's writing in the future? How do they look from our
current vantage point?
4. Does Woolf think poems are
superior to novels? Explain.
5. Why, in Woolf's view, did
Elizabethan women not write poetry?
6. How does Woolf treat the question
of the female body? What does she mean when she says at the end
of Chapter 4 that "the book has somehow to
be adapted to the body"?
7. Woolf is careful to acknowledge
the unmeasured and immeasurable value of the labor women have traditionally done.
Yet she also projects a future in which women will have access to
all kinds of careers. Does Woolf come down in favor of one or the
other of these lifestyles? What does she take to be the pros and
cons of each?
