The fiction portion became Woolf's most popular novel during her lifetime, The Years, which charts social change from 1880 to the time of publication through the lives of the Pargiter family.

The entire essay is structured as a response to an educated gentleman who has written a letter asking Woolf to join his efforts to help prevent war.

Woolf opens her response by stating first, and with some slight hyperbole, that this is "a remarkable letter—a letter perhaps unique in the history of human correspondence, since when before has an educated man asked a woman how in her opinion war can be prevented.

"[3]: 3  This sets up the fundamental tension of the work between, on the one hand, the desire to leave behind the stifling private home so as to help prevent war, an aim that Woolf certainly shares with her interlocutor, and, on the other, an unwillingness to simply ally with the public world of men.

Both allow Woolf to articulate her criticisms of the structure of education and the professions, which mostly involves showing how they encourage the very attitudes that lead to Fascism both at home and abroad.

The question and answer format creates a sense of dialogue and debate on the politically charged issues the essay tackles, rather than just presenting simple polemical diatribes on each topic.

The principle of dialogue is one that informs much of Woolf's work, and is also seen in her novels when she gives voice to different classes and marginalised groups in society through a diversity of characterisations.

The "guineas" of the book's title are themselves a badge of social class, the money amount of 21 shillings (1.05 pounds sterling) for which no coin any longer existed, but which was still the common denomination for solely upper-class transactions (e.g., purchase of pictures or race-horses, lawyers' or medical specialists' fees, and so on.).

[6] The ideology of fascism was an affront to Woolf's conviction in pacifism as well as feminism: Nazi philosophy, for example, supported the removal of women from public life.

She denounces the essay because it is only concerned with "the daughters of educated men", seeing Woolf's criticisms as irrelevant to most women because her wealth and aristocratic ancestry means she is "insulated by class".

[9] In response, Woolf scholar Elizabeth Shih defended Three Guineas and claimed Dalrymple's article was full of "ad hominem moments".