Wollstonecraft, Mary. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects. Source Book Press, 1971.
Reason read: March is Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day was last Marth 8th. Read in honor of all women everywhere.
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman was originally published in 1792. Nearly 180 years later when Source Book Press republished it, women were still clamoring for those rights. Title IX of the Education Amendments wasn’t even a thing until 1972. Think about that for just one second. In 1792 Wollstonecraft was demanding justice for her half of the human race as loudly as she could. Hers was a plea for all womenkind and not a singular selfish act of only thinking of herself. She argued that reason, virtue, and knowledge were the keys to a successful life regardless of your sex. However, the notion that physical strength promotes power indicates a man’s authority over a weaker woman exists even today. To put it crudely, inequality among the sexes is still a thing. To be sentimental is to be silly.
Wollstonecraft was not afraid to challenge her readers, asking us what does it mean to be respectable? To have virtue? To be a woman of quality? Are these traits euphemisms for weakness? She addresses the assumption that women are designed to feel before applying reason. Maybe that is why men are trained to never argue with a woman in public (she might become irrational) or allow a woman to exert physical strength (unseemly). Most of Wollstonecraft’s arguments are disguised as philosophical and moral conversations with Rousseau.
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman introduced me to a seraglio. I had never heard the word before.
As an aside, when Wollstonecraft talked about the overgrown child I had an ah-ha moment. I know a man-child who refuses to grow up. It all makes sense now.
As another aside, back in the late 1970s or early 80s, my parents subscribed to a number of magazines. I clearly remember a cigarette advertisement picturing a woman laughing, mouth wide open and head thrown back with a cigarette in her hand. The caption read, “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby!” Even as a kid I remember questioning what it all meant. Were they proclaiming women now had the right to smoke? Smoke in public? Smoke that particular brand? And why the word baby?
Author fact: Everyone knows Mary Wollstonecraft is the Mary Shelley who wrote Frankenstein and in case you forgot, the Shelley is the last name of Percy Bysshe Shelley.
Book trivia: Wollstonecraft had never written a dedication before. She decided to dedicate A Vindication of the Rights of Woman to the Bishop of Autun in response to a pamphlet he wrote.
Nancy said: Pearl calls Vindication an “influential feminine essay” (More Book Lust p 146).
BookLust Twist: I am reading the unabridged republication of the 1792 London edition. From More Book Lust in the chapter called “Literary Lives: the Brits” (p 146).
~*LunaSea*~ 