In Virginia Woolf’s novel A Room of One’s Own, she mentions constantly how she believes that in order for a woman to write, she needs at least five hundred pounds a year and a room of her own.  The purpose of the room is to allow for a setting where a woman can cultivate ideas without all of the distractions, and the 500 pounds a year is to provide a stable salary upon which a woman can comfortably live.  She directs her statement solely towards women because at the time of her book, women were still not quite seen as authors.  Some people even looked down on female writers just because of their gender, and it made it very difficult to be able to flourish as a writer.  Woolf created the requirements not to combat this social inequality, but just to show that women are as capable as men to become authors if they are put under similar conditions.

While it is possibly true that these basic requirements are the standard for everyone, I also believe that everyone has their own special requirements.  For me personally, I always need a motive for any time that I write.  Unlike Woolf or most other authors, I never find the inspiration to write “just because”.  Additionally, while it is not necessarily a do-or-die requirement, I usually listen to music when I am writing my first draft.  Similar to having a room of one’s own, listening to music helps drown out all of the background noise.  While I don’t believe that either of my requirements are absolutely mandatory for writing, I do believe that like Woolf’s room of one’s own, they provide me with the best setting to flourish.