[Vwoolf] encountering Virginia Woolf

[Jeanette E McVicker]

I've been swept up in everyone's reminiscences.... here is yet another. I
first encountered Woolf in a 20th c British women writers course taught by
Margaret M Rowe as a sophomore at Purdue: *To the Lighthouse *was part of
the mix with Margaret Drabble, Olive Schreiner, Iris Murdoch, and many
others I'd never heard of. I was transfixed by Woolf's novel. In a women's
studies intro course, I read *AROO *which together with the activism of the
campus women's group, revealed how literature and politics connected. It
led me to a chapter on *Mrs Dalloway* in grad school (with another on
Beauvoir) and that brought me to this incredible group of scholars and
friends, and a future career path I never could have imagined for myself
back then. Teaching Woolf and Winterson this past spring and especially
doing a unit on *The Waves* transformed me yet again, watching my
20-something students find resonant connections so different from but
deeply connected to what I was experiencing as their 50-something teacher.
Felt like a bit of a circle closing, and reopening. To echo Diana, thank
you Virginia.

Jan

-- 
Jeanette McVicker, Ph.D.
Professor and Advanced Program Coordinator, English
Chair, Graduate Council (2013-2014)

office: Fenton 241
email: mcvicker at fredonia.edu
vmail: 716.673.3861)
fax:    716.673.4661
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