“I do not wish them [women] to have power over men; but over themselves.”
These words are taken from “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman”, written by the political philosopher and writer Mary Wollstonecraft. She is considered to be one of the founders in feminist thinking, a prolific and thought-provoking writer for her time, her observations on society and culture would prove influential for generations to come.
She was born in Spitalfields, London in April 1759 and spent much of her youth on the move as her father squandered the family’s chance of financial security. Mary grew up in difficult surroundings with an abusive father, forcing her to fulfil a role as protector for her sisters, Everina and Eliza, and also for her mother who was at the receiving end of her father’s rage.
In a desperate bid to help her family, she would sleep outside her mother’s bedroom, hoping to prevent a drunken attack from her father. She also persuaded her sister to leave her husband after she started suffering depression, which sadly resulted in her sister becoming a social pariah.
Mary would rely on more positive outside influences for help, most particularly from her good friendships with Jane Arden and Fanny Blood. The Arden family would prove important in broadening Mary’s intellectual horizons as the family discussed science, philosophy and history.
By 1778, Mary was looking for a way to leave her family household and went on to accept a position as a lady’s companion for a widow in Bath. The experience sadly proved to be a negative one as the two women failed to find common ground. Within two years of leaving, she would return home to look after her mother who she nursed until her death.
After such tragedy she was taken in by the family of her good friend Fanny Blood. The two young women began to make plans to live together, although a lack of funds held them back.
Eventually Mary, with her sisters and Fanny set up a school in Newington Green. This was an exciting project that unfortunately was to be cut short when Fanny married and moved to Portugal with her husband, after suffering poor health.
Worried for the state of her friend, Mary abandoned the school and joined her in Portugal to nurse her back to health, but sadly she could not and her childhood friend passed away. Both Fanny and the school had gone and it was at this moment that Mary wrote her first novel, “Mary: A Fiction”.
In a state of grief, it was once again Mary’s friends who would help her to get back on her feet, this time assisting in finding her position as a governess for the Kingsborough family in Ireland. Although she was not well liked by the lady of the house, she did help to inspire the children and in turn the experience would inspire her to create a children’s book.
Whilst her position as a governess was stable, her true passion was for literature, so she took the rather unorthodox career path of becoming a writer, something which few women were able to successfully accomplish in her era and which she described herself as a “new genus”.
With her sights set on her new career path, she moved to London and found a place to live. Her first step in her literary career was learning French and German so that she could translate texts.
Furthermore, she was helped at the time by the publisher Joseph Johnson. Attending dinners and completing reviews for his periodical, she immediately immersed herself in a world of intellectuals and philosophers who would help to inspire and encourage her writing.
Whilst she considered Johnson to be a good friend, she had meanwhile embarked on a rather complicated affair with the artist Henry Fuseli. After the outrageous suggestion by Mary that she could live together with Fuseli and his wife, the two parted company. Humiliated and seeking solace elsewhere, Wollstonecraft turned to France for her next source of inspiration.
In 1790, the publication of Wollstonecraft’s “Vindication of Rights of Men” earned her critical acclaim and it sold out in just three weeks. The pamphlet was produced by Mary in response to Edmund Burke’s “Reflections on the Revolution in France” which defended the institutions of monarchy, the social hierarchy it instils and the Church. Meanwhile, Mary’s pamphlet strongly argued for republicanism, criticising the inherent privileges created by social hierarchies which restrict people. Her rebuttal was produced only a month after the release of Burke’s publication and a second edition was published not long afterwards, revealing Wollstonecraft as the author.
A year later, inspired by the feedback she had received, Wollstonecraft went on to produce arguably her most famous work, a follow-up called “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman”.
This was provoked in part by Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord’s report to the French National Assembly in which he argued that women would be better suited to a domestic education.
Wollstonecraft’s response to Talleyrand incorporated a wide-range of philosophical concepts which at the heart were based around the problematic double standards which pervaded society.
She addressed the wider point of natural rights to which we are all entitled, whilst addressing the issue of female education and the importance of treating women as equals in society rather than as mere objects.
With some surprise, the publication received a rather warm welcome and the reception provoked a second edition and a translation into French in 1792.
Meanwhile, Mary had arrived in France at one of the most dramatic moments in the history of the country. With King Louis XVI guillotined and a reign of terror sweeping a nation, this was a difficult, unsafe and uncomfortable time to be in France. Nevertheless, Wollstonecraft remained inspired by her surroundings. This would lead to her publication of “An Historical and Moral View of the French Revolution”, in which she attempted to argue for the achievements of the revolution, as well as evoke a condemnation for the “Reign of Terror” and the Jacobin view of women.
Whilst in France, living under febrile political and social circumstances, Mary embarked on an unconventional tryst with an American called Gilbert Imlay with whom she would have a child, a little girl named after her old friend, Fanny.
Though her love life was unconventional, exotic and experimental, her writing continued despite the danger to herself and others. Sadly, she would lose many friends to the guillotine.
Meanwhile, Gilbert Imlay was growing restless with the new found domesticity and ended up leaving her and Fanny, despite promising to meet them again.
That year proved to be one of the harshest winters on record, leaving many in Paris to die from starvation after the rivers which were needed to transport food froze. After pleading for help from Imlay, she returned to England with her daughter Fanny and refered to herself as “Mrs Imlay” despite never marrying, giving her daughter more legitimacy as a result.
By 1795, Mary was failing to cope with the rejection by Imlay and attempted to take her own life. Desperate to win back his affections, she even volunteered to complete business transactions for him in Scandinavia, travelling alone with her daughter. The trip was to no avail; she could not win him back and this led to a second suicide attempt, jumping into the River Thames only to be rescued by a passer-by.
After dealing with her personal torment, she would look to her writing as a source of comfort, helped once again by Joseph Johnson who had been a good friend.
Within this safe social circle, Mary embarked on a romance with William Godwin and the two married after finding out she was pregnant. They would go on to have a daughter in August 1797 called Mary. The future Mary Shelley, she would go on to have her own successful literary career.
Only a few days after the birth, it soon became clear that something was wrong and tragically days later Mary passed away from septicaemia, sadly a common occurrence in the day. Godwin was left heartbroken.
Mary Wollstonecraft was a complex woman who had lived a difficult life and had somehow managed, despite the heartache, to produce inspiring, thought-provoking literature, much of it ahead of its time.
Wollstonecraft was a philosopher and writer, a pioneer of feminism who was not afraid to launch a scathing social critique, nor argue or appeal for a more just and moralistic society. She challenged the social norms and in doing so created a legacy for others, both men and women, to follow in her footsteps.
****FUN FACT: On 1st February 2023, Trinity College Dublin, whose library has forty busts, all of men, unveiled four new busts representing women, including Ada Lovelace and Mary Wollstonecraft.
Jessica Brain is a freelance writer specialising in history. Based in Kent and a lover of all things historical.
Published: 12th November 2024.
