She had the quickest fancy, a gift like her brother's, for
the tune of words. Like him, she had a taste for the
theatre. She stood at the stage door; she wanted to act,
she said. Men laughed in her face. The manager-a fat,
loose-lipped man-guffawed. He bellowed something
about poodles dancing and women acting-no woman, he
said, could possibly be an actress. He hinted-you can
imagine what. She could get no training in her craft.
Could she even seek her dinner in a tavern or roam the
streets at midnight? Yet her genius was for fiction and
lusted to feed abundantly upon the lives of men and
women.
-A Room of One's Own,
Virginia Woolf
How does the rhetorical question develop the central
idea?
O The question is used to make the point that
inequality experienced by women extended beyond
the theatre.
O The question is used to emphasize the girl's
innocence by reminding readers that she is too
young to engage in social activities at night.
O The question is used to make readers question why
women were not allowed to participate in theatrical
productions.
O The question is used to create a metaphor that
makes a direct comparison between male and
female actors.