Virginia Woolf's Renaissance Woman Reader or Common Reader [Paperback]

Dusinberre's book explores Woolf's search, in The Common Reader and other non-fictional writings, for an alternative literary tradition for women. Of equal interest to students of Virginia Woolf and of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century writing, it discusses Montaigne, Donne, Sir John Harington, Dorothy Osborne, Madame de Sevigne, Pepys and Bunyan, together with forms of writing, such as essays, letters and diaries, traditionally associated with women. Questions about printing, the body and the relation between amateurs and professionals create fascinating connections between the early modern period and Virginia Woolf.Acknowledgements - Virginia Woolf's Renaissance: Amateurs and Professionals - Montaigne's Essays: Them and Us - Virginia Woolf Reads John Donne - Letters as Resistance: Dorothy Osborne, Madame de Sevigne and Virginia Woolf - Diaries: Samuel Pepys and Virginia Woolf - Bunyan and Virginia Woolf: a History and a Language of Their Own - The Body and the Book - Notes - Abbreviations - Bibliography - Index