Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Dedication
- Abbreviations
- Introduction: From Michel de Montaigne to the New Media: Reading Virginia Woolf in the Twenty-First Century
- Part I ‘Theorising’ Reading, ‘Theorising’ Language
- Part II The Politics of Writing
- 3 The Rhetoric of Performance in A Room of One's Own
- 4 Interrogating ‘Wildness’
- Part III Dialogue and Dissent
- Conclusion: ‘Thinking Against the Current’
- Bibliography
- Index
4 - Interrogating ‘Wildness’
from Part II - The Politics of Writing
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Dedication
- Abbreviations
- Introduction: From Michel de Montaigne to the New Media: Reading Virginia Woolf in the Twenty-First Century
- Part I ‘Theorising’ Reading, ‘Theorising’ Language
- Part II The Politics of Writing
- 3 The Rhetoric of Performance in A Room of One's Own
- 4 Interrogating ‘Wildness’
- Part III Dialogue and Dissent
- Conclusion: ‘Thinking Against the Current’
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Alas, laid on the grass how small, how insignificant this thought of mine looked. … But however small it was, it had, nevertheless, the mysterious property of its kind – put back into the mind, it became at once very exciting, and important; and as it darted and sank, and flashed hither and thither, set up such a wash and tumult of ideas that it was impossible to sit still. It was thus that I found myself walking with extreme rapidity. Instantly a man's figure rose to intercept me. … His face expressed horror and indignation. Instinct rather than reason came to my help; he was a Beadle; I was a woman. This was the turf; there was the path. Only the Fellows and Scholars are allowed here; the gravel is the place for me. … Once, presumably, this quadrangle with its smooth lawns, its massive buildings, and the chapel itself was marsh, too, where the grasses waved and the swine rootled. … Certainly, as I strolled around the court, the foundation of gold and silver seemed deep enough; the pavement laid solidly over the wild grasses.
Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's OwnTurf. Gravel path. Smooth lawns. Wild grasses. Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own not only establishes territory, possession, boundaries, and the marking of ground but also qualifies this territorial imperative with its self-conscious fictionalisation of ‘Fernham’ and ‘Oxbridge’.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Virginia Woolf and the Politics of Language , pp. 65 - 82Publisher: Edinburgh University PressPrint publication year: 2010