In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens by Alice Walker and A Room of One's Own by Virginia WoolfIt is interesting to compare the points of view of Alice Walker and Virgina Woolf on the same topic. These writers show how versatile the English language can be. Alice Walker was born in 1944 as a farmer in Georgia. Virginia Woolf was born in London in 1882. Both became highly regarded writers of their time and both have quite an extensive portfolio of work. The scenes they may have grown up seeing and experiencing may have greatly influenced their view of the topics they both seem to write about. In her essay "Finding Our Mothers' Gardens," Alice Walker first discusses the untouchable faith of black women in the post-Reconstruction South. It speaks volumes about the faith and eternal hope of these women and their families. He even goes so far as to recognize them as saints as he describes their faith as “so intense, deep, unconscious, that they themselves were unaware of the wealth they possessed” (Walker 694). In a passage discussing the treatment and social status of 16th-century women, Woolf explains that a woman who had a truly great gift in that era "would surely have gone mad, shot herself, or ended up in some cottage lonely out of town, half witch and half wizard, feared and mocked" (Woolf 749). His use of some of these powerful nouns shows that he feels strongly about what he is writing. For her too, life growing up and the stories she may have heard may have greatly influenced this transition. In his passage he imagines what it would have been like if William Shakespeare had had a sister. She realizes how difficult it would be to even give...... middle of paper ...... first person and imagine the South very easily because of how descriptive she is in her narrative. The reader of Woolf's essay can clearly understand and come to realize the injustice and utter cruelty of the sheer neglect of hidden talent among many women over time. It does this simply by telling a good story. This perhaps shows that Virginia Woolf may have been passionate about Walker's work. Woolf chooses to clearly state and agree with the same points made by Walker and shows the ideas in a different light because she is indeed a different person with different attributes. This comes across especially in his rewriting of "In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens." Works Cited: Walker, Alice. Searching for our mother's gardens. New York: Harcourt Brace Javanovich, 1983. Woolf, Virginia. A room of one's own. San Diego, CA: Harvest-HBJ, 1989.