Women as Trespassers in Literature

In A Room of One's Own, our writer touches on many reasons why most women cannot find a place for themselves in the field of literature. She gives personal anecdotes as well as hypothetical examples to get her point across. One of her anecdotes is about being denied access to a library that was only for men. She gives this anecdote to show that women do not get the chance to write and/or record their ideas in order not to be trespassers in "men's territory." When Virginia Woolf first mentions her experience as a trespasser in her book, she aimed to do something with the idea she had in her mind at that time, and to execute that idea, with the help of her excitement, she almost trespassed on the turf of men but was not allowed to do so, and the idea flew away while she was trying not to trespass. This experience of hers stands as a symbol for all the women, including herself, who are burning inside with wonderful, even if small, ideas but cannot act on them because there is a turf and a library that are only for men and do not accept women, no matter how bright they are. In the haste of trying to avoid being a trespasser and involving herself in men’s territory, women’s ideas, excitements, and talents disappear. Thus, women mostly stay in the background, hidden from everyone, having to keep their talents to themselves. So, Woolf’s goal is to show how women are not given a chance to step on men’s turf to execute good ideas, and thus many good ideas are lost in the stream with her trespasser experience, which she used as a symbol in her book A Room of One’s Own.