Are Money and Privacy Necessary?

After reading Virginia Woolf's thesis statement that "women must have money and privacy in order to write," I was a little skeptical at first (viii). However, as I continued to read the book, I understood and agreed with her viewpoint, to a certain degree.

Money that women earned for themselves was essential to facilitate the writing process. Money provided food, clothing, shelter, etc. If these basic needs were not met, than one would not even conceive the notion of writing a book until they were met. However, in order to satisfy these needs, women needed money. During the Elizabethan era, however, it was not common for women to have their own money; they were forced to give it to their husbands. Women were given "pin money, which depended on the good will of her father [and] was only enough to keep her clothed" (52). This money did not last long. In order to earn money, women had to obtain jobs so that they could work for themselves. As a result, if they were out working all day, they would not have time to write a novel when they returned home.

On the other hand, I do not think that a room of one's own was an essential factor in the writing process. As Woolf mentions, women would write in the family rooms where they were "subject to all kinds of casual interruptions" (67). Nevertheless, Jane Austen wrote Pride and Prejudice in her sitting room, hiding the manuscript under the blotting paper when anyone entered the room (67). Therefore, the necessity of a room depends on the woman. As was mentioned in class, money and a room would make the writing process easier, but in some cases they are not essential for every woman writer to be successful.