We all know the gender gap exists in the publishing world. For example, one study shows
that books by female authors make up only a small percentage of collectible books priced at $500 or more. Nevertheless the work of Virginia Woolf is highly collectable. She is among the 10 most collectible female authors at AbeBooks.
Here is the list of the 10 most collectible female authors posted on the AbeBooks website:
- Jane Austen
- Virginia Woolf
- Ayn Rand
- Harper Lee
- Agatha Christie
- Mary Ann Evans/George Eliot
- Beatrix Potte
- Toni Morrison
- Mary Shelley
- J.K. Rowling
The data
AbeBooks.com analyzed a random sample of their sales for collectible books priced $500 or more. The company was dismayed to learn that only 4.8 percent of those books had been written by women.
“We had expected to see an imbalance but not one of such significance,” noted the website.
The reason for the imbalance is the long history of male privilege that gives men priority for the public sphere, including publishing, while women are relegated to the domestic sphere.
“There are simply fewer female authors of significance across the past 500 years of publishing. Many female writers wrote anonymously or privately published their work. Most simply did not even have the opportunity to become published authors,” according to AbeBooks.
Woolf broke the rules to become an important figure in modernist literature and feminism in general. Her novels –Mrs Dalloway(1925), To the Lighthouse (1927) and Orlando (1928) – are landmarks in 20th century literature. Her success is all the more remarkable since she struggled with mental illness for most of her life. A Room of One’s Own (1929) might be her most important work, this essay argues that women writers need their own space in a literary world dominated by men. -AbeBooks
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