The Common Reader
Virginia Woolf
The Common Reader
"The Common Reader" by Virginia Woolf is a collection of essays written in the early 20th century. The book is a thoughtful examination of literature through the lens of the ordinary reader, emphasizing the value of reading for pleasure and the unique perspective that non-experts bring to literary criticism. Woolf's exploration includes both historical and contemporary figures in literature, focusing on the experiences, thoughts, and opinions of the common reader in relation to the complexities of literary appreciation. The opening of "The Common Reader" begins with a quote from Dr. Johnson that sets the tone for Woolf’s reflection on the role of the common reader, who, unencumbered by academic prejudice, has a genuine intuition towards what constitutes good poetry and literature. Woolf contrasts the common reader with critics and scholars, suggesting that the former possess a unique insight born from personal engagement with texts. She introduces this theme by discussing the history of the Paston family and their correspondence, which encapsulates the everyday aspirations, concerns, and lives of individuals from a particular era, highlighting how these narratives shape the larger tapestry of literary history.
About the book
Published in 1925, The Common Reader is a collection of Virginia Woolf's essays on books and the people who wrote them. Its title comes from Samuel Johnson's praise of the common reader, who reads for pleasure rather than to correct others, and Woolf writes as one. The essays range from the Paston letters and Chaucer to Montaigne, the Elizabethans, Defoe, Jane Austen, George Eliot, Joseph Conrad and the Russian novelists, and include Modern Fiction, her argument that the novelist must record the atoms of experience as they fall upon the mind. Many of the essays began as reviews, and Woolf keeps a reviewer's lightness while writing some of the most searching criticism of her time.
About the author
Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) was an English novelist and essayist, and one of the central figures of literary modernism. She wrote novels that follow consciousness rather than plot — a day in a city, a decade passing in an empty house — and found a form for the way attention actually moves. With her husband Leonard she ran the Hogarth Press, which published her own books along with T. S. Eliot and the first English translations of Freud. Her work includes Mrs Dalloway, To the Lighthouse, Orlando, The Waves and the essay A Room of One's Own.