Three Guineas

Woolf begins by addressing an unnamed letter writer. Three years ago, the person asked her a question—“How in your opinion are we to prevent war?” (3)—which neither she, nor anyone else, has yet resolved. Though many have posed answers, these have been unsatisfactory: Each answer requires lengthy explanation and provokes certain “difficulties so fundamental” (3) as to make them incomprehensible. But Woolf wishes to provide an answer, especially given the question’s uniqueness: Never, she states, has an educated man asked a woman for her opinion on this matter. Even if the response is doomed to fail, she must try.

Woolf describes the person to whom she addresses her letter: a balding, middle-aged man whose hair is turning grey. The man is moderately successful and fairly well educated. Both he and Woolf come from “the educated class” (4), but there exists a “gulf so deeply cut” (4) between them that Woolf has been thus far unable to respond to him. She outlines the difference in funds available to educate daughters versus sons, especially Arthur’s Education Fund (a reference to a novel by William Thackeray that Woolf uses to represent the great efforts families make to educate sons). Because of this disparity, she and the correspondent see the world very differently—and one must consider this difference when approaching the question of how to prevent