Wednesday, September 4, 2013

A Room of One's Own, Section 1-2 Continued Discussion

At the end of today's class, we were talking about how when we read Woolf we should consider her reasoning for why she went about writing the way she did. One of the things that I noticed as she was developing her ideas and really liked in Section 1 was when she referred to her thoughts in terms of fishing.

She wrote, "Thought- to call it a prouder name than it deserved- had let its lie down into the stream. It swayed, minute after minute, hither and thither among the reflections and the weeds, letting the water lift it and sink it, until- you know the little tug- the sudden conglomeration of an idea at the end of one's line: and then the cautious hauling of it in, and the careful laying of it out? Alas, laid on the grass how small, how insignificant this thought of mine looked; the sort of fish that a good fisherman puts back in the water so it may grow fatter and be one day worth cooking and eating," (p.17).

I find how she considered her idea in terms of fishing and not catching a good/ big one rather clever. I think she is trying to take us through the process that she goes through when thinking about what women and fiction mean, but could she also be using this analogy to show us that maybe women's fiction is insignificant, just as catching a small fish? What do you think?

-Jessica Mitchell

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