‘The Feminist Note in the Essay’: Some Rhetorical Devices in the Essays of Virginia Woolf

Abstract

[Abstract] The essays of Virginia Woolf have traditionally transcended for their emphasis on women’s position throughout History as regards their continual lack of intellectual and material opportunities in a men-ruled world, which have prevented them from accomplishing their yearnings. Woolf expresses these views assembling a whole of rhetorical elements, in which arguments and literary figures are interwoven in such a way that the common reader should recognise her opinions and reflect upon them, alongside the literary value of the texts. Consequently, in this paper we select and describe some of her most relevant argumentative devices present in a number of these essays possessing a feminist stance, so as to convey a glimpse of the style of her essays.