A Room Of One's Own And £500 A Year.

[sandyRoe]

That line was penned in 1929. What sum would be needed in these times to equal that £500?

[sunny-dave]

https://www.in2013dollars.com/uk/inflation/1929?amount=500

[sunny-dave]

About £34k

[sandyRoe]

I guess a struggling writer could manage on 35K a year.

[jno]

isn't the state pension somewhere in the region of £9000? I'm sure Woolf wouldn't have wanted more to live on than the humble workman. However, the online calculator suggests £23,000, so perhaps the pension hasn't kept pace with modern life.

[sandyRoe]

I don't know much about her but if she'd needed to live on a workman's wage and lived in the housing conditions most endured she might never have put pen to paper.

[THECORBYLOON]

The Bank of England inflation calculator gives a figure of £22,177.70 up to 2021.

[Peter Pedant]

I have to say that I am not sure how life worked then
Woolf's husband was a publisher so cannot have been short of a bob or two

and yet she 'had to ' write a review ( of 16th cent Italian lit, I think) because she wanted the lou-lou to rent a house in Tuscany for the summer.

Woolf lived in Tavistock Sq ( in the bombed out range that is now a Hotel, AND one of my relations was a med student ( 'Royal Freak') at the Free ( hence Freak geddit) and lodged in Tavistock square ( but not with the short of money Woolfs). How disappointing

[Spicerack]

A labourer would earn £50-£100 a year then. Others less.
Live like a king on £500.

[sandyRoe]

She must have been something of a celebrity writer by then is she could get enough to rent a villa from writing a review of a piece of obscure Italian literature.