Virginia Woolf on the Plight of Women in Society
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Virginia Woolf was a writer who was much concerned with the general plight of women in literature in her era. Indeed, she showed considerable interest and concern with the place of women in her society and with the need for women to foster a solidarity with one another, making her a feminist in her point of view. Her feminism derived from her perception of the very real discrimination experienced by women throughout Victorian society, and the woman as artist also had to overcome a degree of prejudice against her and her work. At the same time, it is evident that women in the arts did achieve a certain freedom from the structures of society that other women could not, and Woolf herself is a clear example of this. Her personal life shows considerable divergence form the mores of her time, yet her writings also show that she was fully aware of the social restrictions faced by women in general. In her fiction, relationships between women serve as examples of how women can and do support one another in some cases and undermine one another in others. Among these relationships are mother-daughter relationships which in part may derive from her own odd relationship with her mother and from her observation of other such relationships, and the mother-daughter relationship is key in much of Woolf's fiction. The issue of the plight of women in society has been addressed directly by different writers, and Virginia Woolf showed concern for the matter
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her to marry and commit herself to a domestic life as a way of surviving.
MichFlle Barrett writes,
In considering the effect of women's social situation on their writing Virginia Woolf stresses the important differences in the opportunities open for women of different social classes and at different period of history (Barrett 7).
Until the end of the seventeenth century, only eccentric women from the aristocracy who could surreptitiously "dabble" in writing. Women were prevented from writing in part because they lacked the necessary education, and if they had the education, they could dabble if they were not trying to make a living.
WOOLF AND SOCIETY
Woolf describes her own situation in different essays and shows indirectly how her ability to write and to sell her writing does not alter the fact that the system militates against women. She is able to do what she does because she does not need the money as some women do:
But to show how little I deserve to be called a professional woman, how little I know of the struggles and difficulties of such lives, I have to admit that instead of spending that sum upon bread and butter, rent, shoes and stockings, or butcher's bills, I went out and bought a cat. . . (Woolf, On Women a
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Approximate Word count = 3915
Approximate Pages = 16 (250 words per page)
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