Mary Wollstonecraft: Language and References

One of the most prominent feminist writers at the time was Mary Wollstonecraft. Her daughter, Mary Shelley would go on to write Frankenstein, but she is very famous in her own right. She wrote several works including a history on the French revolution and a cookbook (1). Nevertheless, it is her work A Vindication of the Rights of Women that has earned her her place in the history books. I recently read her book and decided to review it for this blog. In it she argues for women to have an education for the betterment of all of humanity. Women, she argues, cannot raise their children to have virtues of modesty and the appropriate levels of patriotism and capacity for reason unless she has them herself. Women should be educated, because then she is better able to educate and raise her own children.

Virtue not Vanity

She admits that men are physically superior to women, in that they are on average stronger, but that men try to make women their mental inferiors as well by reducing them to something pretty to look at instead of a rational human being capable of complex thought and innovative ideas. Instead of aiming to be pretty, she argues that “elegance is inferior to virtue”* and pleads with her fellow women to “acquire strength, both of mind and body”. Throughout the rest of the book, she demonstrates that even if men of the time were correct that women are irrational creatures given to ridiculous fits of fancy, it is men who have kept them in this state and through their own inherent original sin drawn women into a corrupt state of being.

It is time to effect a revolution in female manners - time to restore to them their lost dignity. It is time to separate unchangeable morals from local manners.

Complicated Language

Before laying out her main proposition, Mary Wollstonecraft says that she wants to avoid overly flowery language and instead speak plainly. However, She uses very sophisticated language whenever she talks about the sexist attitudes of the period or the moral laxity that women are allowed to fall into as they are only charged with being concerned with their looks and tricking their husbands to keep them in the apple of their eye. With phrases like “muddy current of conversation,” “voluptuous reveries,” and “coquettish slave”, Wollstonecraft seems to be subtly mocking the popular opinion of the time held by writers like Jean-Jacques Roseau, the blank-slate Genevan philosopher, and John Gregory, the Scottish moralist, that women should obey their husbands and be pretty.

Make women rational creatures, and free citizens, and they will quickly become good wives; - that is, if men do not neglect the duties of husbands and fathers.

Plain Language

In contrast, whenever she gives her own argument, Mary speaks in straightforward terms. Women should gain their husband’s “Calm tenderness of friendship” and “the confidence of respect” instead of attempting in vain to eternally incite lust and nothing else from their husbands. “Fondness is a poor substitute for friendship!”  she declares. By using more complicated language to talk about Roseau’s and Dr. Gregory’s depreciating views of women and plain language when giving her own, Mary Wollstonecraft effectively creates a divide between their convoluted nonsense and her own argument, which should be common sense.

Women are systematically degraded by receiving the trivial attentions which men think it manly to pay to the sex, when, in fact, men are insultingly supporting their own superiority.

References

Additionally, throughout her book, The Vindication of the Rights of Women, Wollstonecraft constantly underlines and provides evidence for her argument by referencing notable scholars and literature, demonstrating her point that a well-educated woman is better able to reason and is more morally virtuous. Mary Wollstonecraft is nothing if not well read. In addition to disagreeing with Roseau and Dr. Gregory, she critiques Milton’s description of Eve in paradise lost claiming that women should be aligned with God’s values of virtue and not just beauty. Similarly, she demonstrates a considerable knowledge of poetry by quoting Alexander Pope, Lovelace, and Dryden. She also references Cervantes’ Don Quixote, Johnson Smith’s Gulliver’s Travels and Shakespeare’s Macbeth and Hamlet. Likewise she demonstrates great knowledge of the philosophers of the time like, as I mentioned earlier, Roseau and Dr. Gregory, but also Dr. Priestly, Samuel Johnson, Lord Bacon, Leibniz, and many others.

My Summative Thoughts

            Overall, I found Mary Wollstonecraft to be a very articulate writer who balances fancy language with, now thankfully, common sense ideas and straightforward language. Her consistent literary references made this book fascinating to read and I loved her open distaste for Roseau, a person so highly regarded today, because of his blatantly prejudicial views. It’s always interesting to see what kind of lesser-known antagonism exists between writers of the period. Some might find Mary Wollstonecraft’s apparent acceptance of views of women of the time frustrating, but I believe she does it to avoid an extra unnecessary argument and say that it doesn’t disprove her point that women should be educated.

What about you?

Have you ever read anything by Mary Wollstonecraft? What do you think about her ideas on women? Have you read any other early feminist writings? What should I read next? Let me know in the comments.

Notes:

*All quotes are from A Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft.

Sources:

Image Credit: "Mary Wollstonecraft" by John Opie

(1) “Mary Wollstonecraft” on Wikipedia.org https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Wollstonecraft