A Room of One's Own / Three Guineas by Virginia Woolf

The narrator of the work refers to themself early on in this way: 'Here then was I (call me Mary Beton, Mary Seton, Mary Carmichael or by any name you please-it is not a matter of any importance)'. It was published in 1929 as a book with six chapters. At Girton she was accompanied by Vita Sackville-West. Woolf stayed at Newnham at the invitation of Pernel Strachey, the college principal, whose family were key members of the Bloomsbury Group. Elsie Duncan-Jones, then known as Elsie Phare, was the president of the Newnham Arts Society at the time and wrote an account of the paper, 'Women and Fiction', for the college magazine, Thersites. The book is based on two papers Woolf read on 20 and 26 October 1928 to two Cambridge student societies, the Newnham Arts Society at Newnham College and the ODTAA Society ('One Damn Thing After Another') at Girton College, respectively. Public domain Ī Room of One's Own is in the public domain in many jurisdictions, including Australia and Canada. Abiding by the rule, the woman loses her idea. As the woman starts to think of an idea, metaphorically referred to as a fish, a beadle enforces a rule whereby only Fellows and Scholars, not her, are allowed to walk on the grass. She writes of a woman whose thought had 'let its line down into the stream'. In the book, Woolf’s metaphor of a fish as an idea illustrates her point 'A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction'.

The book is based on two lectures Woolf delivered in October 1928 at Newnham College and Girton College, women's colleges at the University of Cambridge. Vanessa Bell was the designer of the cover of its first edition. A Room of One's Own is a book, first published in September 1929, consisting of an extended essay by Virginia Woolf.

A Room of One's Own / Three Guineas by Virginia Woolf