A Room of One's Own based on a lecture given at Girton College Cambridge is one of the great feminist polemics ranging in its themes from Jane Austen & Charlotte Bronte to the silent fate of Shakespeare's gifted (imaginary) sister & the effects of poverty & sexual constraint on female creativity Three Guineas was published almost a decade later & breaks new ground in its discussion of men militarism & women's attitudes towards war These two pieces reveal Virginia Woolf's fiery spirit & sophisticated wit & confirm her status as a highly inspirational essayist