This essay is often regarded as a rant and written off by Woolf’s critics and detractors. But the prose has a furious energy and there is a recognition here of what masculinity can be like that transcends time and place. The self-regard, the pomposity, the prejudice about the world outside a tiny place of privilege, the greed for power and wealth – not to mention the crass ignorance of anything except itself – are as much with us in 2019 as in 1938.