Background & Content
Who is Virginia Woolf?
She's the author of Shakespeare's Sister.
What is becoming a writer or actor?
Judith runs away to London to pursue this dream.
What is gender inequality (or lack of education and opportunity)?
This is the main barrier that prevents Judith from achieving her potential.
What is A Room of One's Own?
This essay first appeared in Woolf's famous extended essay about women and writing.
What is her gender?
What is social oppression or patriarchy?
Woolf argues that countless women of talent have been lost to history because of this.
Who is Judith Shakespeare?
Woolf imagines this famous playwright's sister as equally talented but denied opportunity.
What is women's creative potential under oppression?
Woolf says Judith's tragic and symbolizes the death of this.
What is domesticity (or confinement)?
The story contrasts Shakespeare's freedom to create with his sister's enforced___.
What are money and a room of one's own?
The story explores the lack of these two things that Woolf says women need to write.
Who are women writers (or artists) of the future?
Despite her death, Woolf says Judith lives on in this generation of women.
What is a room of one's own?
This symbolizes the independence and privacy necessary for creativity.
What is fictionalization or creative speculation?
Woolf uses this literary technique-mixing fact with imagination-to make her argument.
What is the historical silencing of women's genius?
Judith's life story parallels this broader social truth.
What are voices or contributions?
The story implies that the arts and history have traditionally excluded women's_____.