Discussion of “the proper stuff of fiction”—what it has been and what it should be—is the central element of Woolf’s essay and an element both to explore and to push against. The use of the word “proper” itself suggests the authoritative influence of tradition and convention. Writing in the wake of Victorian Realism, Woolf is likely referring to the conventional material of this tradition, which prioritized historical/social novels, the bildungsroman, and a linear narrative as “appropriate” to fiction. The tradition also suggested that a woman was hardly a “proper” author for fiction at all. It is worth noting that many female writers of the previous century—including Jane Austen, whom Woolf invokes, and George Eliot, one of the central figures of the Realist movement—wrote under male pseudonyms to avoid having their writing be dismissed or overlooked.

Woolf therefore immediately separates herself from what “custom” would suggest is the “proper stuff of fiction,” and the rest of the essay debates what the material of modern fiction ought to be and how it ought to be written about. Woolf’s consideration of this question is expansive and open-ended. She cites a number of authors to present examples of what might and might not be the “proper stuff of fiction,” but Woolf is never overly critical even of those she paints as superficial and outdated “materialists.