A Room of One's Own

Virginia Woolf's essay A Room of One's Own is often considered one of the most significant works of feminine literary criticism ever written. The essay is based on a series of lectures she delivered in 1928 at Newnham College and Girton College, two women's colleges at Cambridge University.

The central focus of the essay is that "a woman must have money and a room of her own" if she is to create works of art. Within the essay Woolf imagines the possibility that William Shakespeare had a sister named Judith, and because of her status as a woman, she was denied the opportunity to indulge in the same creative endeavors that her brother was allowed. She reviews the denial of women to seek equal education, claiming that education itself is a patriarchal institution designed to keep women out. Woolf then reviews the careers of several female authors including: Aphra Behn, Jane Austen, the Brontë Sisters and George Eliot, and examines whether women are capable of producing literary works of highest order.

• • Mahalo Guide to Virginia Woolf
• Wikipeda: Virginia Woolf
• Gale: Women's History: Virginia Woolf
• The Free Library: Virginia Woolf (1882 - 1941)
• Literary History: Virginia Woolf (1882 - 1941)
• Virginia Woolf Web: Life and Works of Virginia Woolf
• Time: "How Time Passes" (April 12, 1937)