Write the explanation of the essay entitled "Professions for Women

Write the explanation of the essay entitled “Professions for Women”.

Ans.

Explanations

(1) Writing was a reputable…………………other professions..

Reference: These lines have been selected from the essay Professions for Women, written by Virginia Woolf, a well-known novelist and essayist. This essay is an abbreviated version of the speech Virginia Woolf delivered before a branch of the National Society for Women’s Service.

Context: Virginia Woolf was asked to describe how she became a writer and what were the obstacles that she had to overcome to attain success in the profession of literature.

Explanation: Virginia Woolf says that she had the examples of a fewer women writers when she started writing. She had not many obstacles to overcome. Writing was regarded as a reputed and harmless profession. Writers were held high in esteem and they did not cause any harm to anyone. A writer only moves a pen which does not produce any sound and the family peace is not disturbed by scratching a pen. Writing is not an expensive profession. A writer does not require much money. If a person has ten and six pence he can buy papers enough to write all the plays of Shakespeare provided he has talents to do so. He does not require any musical organ or model that a musician and an artist need. A writer need not to go Vienna and Berlin for writing a story. He does not need masters and mistresses. Many women have succeeded as writer because the writing paper is very cheap. They can afford it.

(2) But wait a moment…………….I killed her.

Reference : This passage refers to the essay. Professions for Women, written by Virginia Woolf.

Context: Virginia Woolf shares her experience of how she attained success in the profession of writing. She says that she was fortunate to sale her very first article. It was published and she was paid one pound ten shillings and sixpence. She bought a beautiful Persian cat from the money she had earned.

Explanation: Woolf says that it is not so easy to write articles and earn money as it appears to be. Articles are written about some. Her own article was about a novel written. by a famous man. She was to write a review of the novel. While she was writing the review she discovered that if she was to review books, she would need to fight a certain ghost, an imaginary fear. The ghost appeared before her in the guise of a woman who instructed her how she should start and what she ought to write and what she ought not. She gave that woman the name of ‘The Angel in the House’ which she derived from a famous poem. The ghost of the woman came between her (Woolf) and the paper suggesting many thing and it became very difficult for her to put words on the paper. She (the ghost or imaginary woman) caused her a great deal of trouble. In order to get rid of the woman, she finally decided to kill her. It means she decided to pay no heed to what she (The Angel in House or ghost) said to her. She wrote without caring for her.

(3) I mean what is a woman……………..piece of information.

Reference : This is an extract from the essay, Professions for Women, written by Virginia Woolf.

Context: Virginia Woolf gives a valuable piece of advice to new women writers. After killing the Angel in the house, the young aspiring woman writer had to be herself, but the question is, “what is herself”.

Explanation: Woolf asks a question-what is a woman? She assures other women that she does not know what a woman is. She does not belief if anyone of them know what a woman is. She says that nobody can know it until she has a vast experience of all the art and professions open to human skill. A woman does not know what she ought to I write about herself. She can’t write frankly about her body, about her desires and about her needs. When it comes to write about herself, she writes what she ought to write and not what she wants to write. Woolf says that she has come to them to tell that they are in the process of revealing them by their experiments what a woman is. They should share their experiments truly. It is only through their failures and successes that they come to know what problems a woman faces when she writes about herself.