处女作指的是作家、导演、演员、歌手等的第一部作品。俗话说，万事开头难。所以，不管他们的处女作能否一炮打响，让他们一夜走红，都会在他们的心里有特殊的位置，给他们留下很深的印象。

请看《中国日报》相关报道：

Soon the job as an art designer could no longer satisfy him. He started writing scripts and in 1994, he got a bank loan for his maiden¹ work.

"From the very beginning I was shooting film by loan," he says, "which gave me big pressure to perform well at box office, otherwise I could have gone to jail. People who are saying that Feng Xiaogang is more focused on market performance than artistic² value don't know the hardships in my early days."

报道中说，艺术设计的工作不久就不能满足冯小刚，于是他开始写剧本，并且在1994年为他的处女作拿到了一笔银行贷款。冯小刚说，从一开始拍电影的时候，他就承受着票房压力。如果票房不好，他可能会因为还不上贷款而进监狱。

这里的“maiden work”指的就是处女作，“work”是“作品”的意思。此外，与“maiden”一起构成的词还有“maiden sword”（新刀，尚未染过血的刀），“maiden battle”（第一仗）和“maiden trip”（首次航行）等。