Three GuineasThree Guineas, published in June 1938 by Woolf's own Hogarth Press, is a feminist, pacifist, anti-fascist, anti-imperialist polemic. It shows Woolf, prior to World War II, at her most politically urgent and reveals how constantly attuned she was to her political, social and cultural surroundings. She was proud of the essay, but grew increasingly worried about the reaction it would elicit from readers and reviewers. She knew she had laid herself bare in this text; her arguments were radical and challenging. Three Guineas had a long and complex gestation and in many ways the text was the fruit of a decade's research. In 1931 the Junior Council of the London and National Society for Women's Service (a former suffragist organisation) invited Woolf and composer, Ethel Smyth, to give a talk on Music and Literature. She agreed, and in preparing for the talk, felt she had conceived the sequel to A Room of One's Own, about the sexual life of women. This sequel became "The Pargiters", a novel-essay, which remained an unfinished manuscript, but turned into The Years (1937), a novel which charts social change from 1880 to the time of publication. Three Guineas grew out of the leftover material from The Years after Woolf had abandoned the novel-essay format. During the 1930s Woolf filled notebooks with clippings and quotations relating to women's oppression and her fear and abhorrence of fascism also grew. She experienced developments in Europe first hand, visiting Fascist Italy in 1933, and Nazi Germany in 1935. She knew that this was not just an enemy abroad: the rise of the British Union of Fascists in London in the early 1930s convinced Woolf that she needed to look within. She also knew that, if war with Germany were to break out, she and Leonard, who was Jewish, would not survive a German invasion. The Woolfs were indeed on the Gestapo's list of targets. Woolf was a committed pacifist, a belief that made her somewhat of an outsider. Many of her formerly pacifist friends, E. M. Forster for instance, had changed their mind when confronted with Hitler. Woolf read widely about fascism and what she read disturbed her on feminist grounds. Nazi policy supported the removal of women from public life and their return to a "traditional" role as mothers and carers. Woolf was involved with many anti-fascist organisations and campaigns but sometimes questioned her involvement on feminist grounds. She felt, for example, that an anti-fascist exhibition she was asked to support had not paid enough attention to the "woman question". Three Guineas is structured as a series of letters. Woolf's epistolary format suggests dialogue, a conversation, which, as in A Room of One's Own, will continue. The narrator has been sent a letter by a barrister with three requests to do with the prevention of war. He asks the narrator to donate money to the cause, to sign a petition and join a society. The text is the answer to that letter. However, in answering the letter, the narrator has to return to two other requests for support which she has received, one from a society supporting women in the professions (based on the London and National Society for Women's Service), and another supporting the rebuilding of a women's college (based on the Newnham College Appeal). Her use of the letter form also emphasises the specificity or contingency of her comments: they are theoretically addressed to one particular person, the reader is party to a private conversation. Three Guineas starts with an acknowledgement of a unique event: that a man should ask a woman her opinion about possible strategies for the prevention of war. The narrator begins by delineating the difference between the correspondents. Supposedly of the same class, the great variation in the barrister and the narrator in terms of legal status, employment opportunities, financial independence and education seem to Our major entries are around 2-2500 words but only the first 600 words or so can be read by non-members. To read about membership, please click here. Published 08 March 2001 Citation: Anna Snaith, Anglia Polytechnic University. "Three Guineas." The Literary Encyclopedia. 8 Mar. 2001. |
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