Three Guineas by Virginia Woolf & [email protected]

Author:Virginia Woolf & [email protected] [Woolf, Virginia, 1882-1941]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Literature
Publisher: The University of Adelaide Library

Notes and references

1. To quote the exact words of one such appeal: ‘This letter is to ask you to set aside for us garments for which you have no further use . . . Stockings, of every sort, no matter how worn, are also most acceptable . . . The Committee find that by offering these clothes at bargain prices . . . they are performing a really useful service to women whose professions require that they should have presentable day and evening dresses which they can ill afford to buy.’ (Extract from a letter received from the London and National Society for Women’s Service, 1938.)

2. The Testament of Joad, by C. E. M. Joad, pp. 210-11. Since the number of societies run directly or indirectly by Englishwomen in the cause of peace is too long to quote (see The Story of the Disarmament Declaration, p. 15, for a list of the peace activities of professional, business and working-class women) it is unnecessary to take Mr Joad’s criticism seriously, however illuminating psychologically.

3. Experiment in Autobiography, by H. G. Wells, p. 486. The men’s ‘movement to resist the practical obliteration of their freedom by Nazis or Fascists’ may have been more perceptible. But that it has been more successful is doubtful. Nazis now control the whole of Austria.’ (Daily paper, 12 March 1938).

4. ‘Women, I think, ought not to sit down to table with men; their presence ruins conversation, tending to make it trivial and genteel, or at best merely clever.’ (Under the Fifth Rib, by C. E. M. Joad, p. 58.) This is an admirably outspoken opinion, and if all who share Mr Joad’s sentiments were to express them as openly, the hostess’s dilemma — whom to ask, whom not to ask — would be lightened and her labour saved. If those who prefer the society of their own sex at table would signify the fact, the men, say, by wearing a red, the women by wearing a white rosette, while those who prefer the sexes mixed wore parti-coloured buttonholes of red and white blended, not only would much inconvenience and misunderstanding be prevented, but it is possible that the honesty of the buttonhole would kill a certain form of social hypocrisy now all too prevalent. Meanwhile, Mr Joad’s candour deserves the highest praise, and his wishes the most implicit observance.

5. According to Mrs H. M. Swanwick, the W.S.P.U. had ‘an income from gifts, in the year 1912, of £42,000.’ (I Have Been Young, by H. M. Swanwick, p. 189.) The total spent in 1912 by the Women’s Freedom League was £26,772 12s. 9d. (The Cause, by Ray Strachey, p. 311.) Thus the joint income of the two societies was £68,772 12s. 9d. But the two societies were, of course, opposed.

6. ‘But, exceptions apart, the general run of women’s earnings is low, and £250 a year is quite an achievement, even for a highly qualified woman with years of experience.’ (Careers and Openings for Women, by Ray Strachey, p. 70.)

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