Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown

The significance of the author has changed in literary history, and in “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” Woolf considers the role of the writer at the beginning of the 20th century. They can be an “authority” (a word that shares the etymological root), but that is not the meaning that emerges in Woolf’s essay. Woolf tells her readers that their “part is to insist that writers shall come down off their plinths and pedestals, and describe beautifully if possible, truthfully at any rate, our Mrs. Brown” (24). This suggests a subversion of the idea of the author being in control of their text and their characters, empowering the reader to a more active role. This changed relationship between author and reader is indicated when Woolf describes it as an “intercourse of friendship” (21) and suggests that they should be “partners in the business of writing books” (23).

There are two related meanings of the term “character” in Woolf’s essay. It means both “human character” in life, in the sense that a person can be said to have a distinct character. This is evident when Woolf refers to all people as judges of character (3). It also means the representation of a character in literature, which can be seen in Woolf’s discussion of the “conventions” of representation and the diverse examples she uses to illustrate the approaches of different writers.