Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf’s big house?

Not Rab, a single room is enough for him because he can write anywhere, really, as long as there’s not a leaky gutter to distract him, or the bin men, or the sunshine...

A room of one’s own is such an evocative expression, encapsulating hope for a bit of space. In the case of the Virginia Woolf essay for which it was the title, the hope was for a place in which a woman could write.

As she grew up in an affluent household in Kensington, I think the Woolfster must have been having a laugh. But, for many people, growing up in small houses, a room of one’s own was a genuine dream.

Growing up now, folk want a house of one’s own, then an estate of one’s own, then an island of one’s own. But I can’t help thinking that all you need is a room.

Indeed, when you read Victorian and Edwardian dramatic (or even dull) fiction, single people nearly always live in just one room. In many cases, this situation persisted right up until the 1970s. My first place away from home was a bedsit – I don’t Once his desk is out of storage, Rab will even have room for his cereal bowl. Picture: Getty Images. think they even do these any more.

I witter thus, having changed my writing room some months ago. My old room was at the front of the hoose and had all the exciting distractions of suburbia: the same man going for the same paper and pint of milk at 11 every morning, the bin men, a grocery delivering van beeping as it reverses. Sounds rather like Las Vegas, I know.

I changed that room (“the study”) for the dining room, which hasn’t seen anyone dining in it for about three years. It’s at the back, and is the nicest room in the house on account of the yellow walls with blue flowers on a ceiling border.

It also looks out on to the back garden, which you would think would be nice, but is often irritating when I spy leaks in the gutter or the sun comes breenging in. Sometimes, at present, I have to sit with the curtains closed for parts of the day.

But I get by, and am appreciative of the space. When I was a proper journalist I used to get sent places once or twice a week and would file my copy from hotel rooms, often with my laptop on my knee. Bung my face in front of a screen and I can write anywhere, but I prefer my own room at home with my reference books handy so I can purloin quotes from proper writers and pretend to be brainy.

The one thing I do miss at the moment is a desk of one’s own. Mine is in storage, in a mate’s garage, and writing on the narrow dining table (with the extensions down) is a tad awkward, as piles of papers and notebooks periodically tumble to the floor in landslides.

I’m trying to write this with an empty cereal bowl jammed into the side of the laptop. I should take it back to the kitchen but am far too busy for that sort of thing.

I’ll persevere here for a bit, in Room at the Back, as I like the wider ambience. I could make some alterations, such as moving the table away from the window or at least sitting where I can’t see the leak in the gutter.

But there’s no rush. It’ll all come right in the end. Room wasn’t built in a day.