Women 100: The Most Influential Women in History: The Most Influential Women in History

Author: Débora G. Field
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-01-01
Features: Mary Wollstonecraft's theories on women's education and women's status are primarily based on her personal experiences. Her father, Edward, abandoned his silk weaving business and moved the family from London to Yorkshire with his wife and six children, attempting to start a farm there. Mary attended school with a friend whose father was a headmaster and received some formal education. The bankruptcy of Edward Wollstonecraft's farm led him to become increasingly depressed, rough, and abusive, as he began to drink excessively and neglect his family. As Wollstonecraft's husband—and one of her biographers—William Godwin wrote: "She would often plunge herself recklessly into his tyranny and violence, hoping to take her mother's place in enduring the beatings." Mary clearly realized she had to earn a living to support herself and her family. At the time, there were few respectable jobs available for women: they could become companions, teachers, or governesses. Wollstonecraft held all three jobs. At nineteen, she left home to accompany Mrs. Dawson and travel to the fashionable spa town of Bath, where she was exposed to the luxurious lifestyle of the upper class. In 1783, Wollstonecraft's sister Eliza's marriage repeated the domestic violence similar to that in their family, and Wollstonecraft intervened on her sister's behalf. With the help of her close friend Fanny Blood, Wollstonecraft took Eliza away from her husband and the three of them opened a school in Newington Green. There, she wrote "Thoughts on the Education of Daughters," in which she argued that girls' intellects should be educated and nurtured. In that conservative era where men were valued for intellect and women for morality, this idea was considered radical. After the school was established, Wollstonecraft accepted a position as a governess for the children of the noble Mrs. King's in Ireland. She began her work at the King's estate with the "same feelings as if I were going to prison." However, her independent and rebellious nature made her unable to tolerate the work as a governess, and she resigned and moved to London. In London, her publisher, Joseph Johnson, provided her with accommodation and an editing job that was sufficient to sustain her. Johnson was a central figure in London's intellectual life, associating with prominent figures such as the American and British political theorist and writer Thomas Paine, the philosopher William Godwin, and the poet William Blake. Most of them were liberals, and Mary shared common interests with them in articles she wrote for Johnson's Analytical Review and when adapting works from the European continent. Mary and her friends were most concerned about the French Revolution. Initially, the British welcomed the revolution with great enthusiasm, hoping to overthrow the outdated autocratic system. However, Edmund Burke's conservative pamphlet Reflections on the Revolution in France, published during the turmoil in France, advocated for supporting the existing monarchy, and this argument caused the British to begin to turn against the revolution. Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman was one of the earliest works to refute Burke's stance. The article focused less on France and more on domestic injustices, challenging Burke's contentment with the status quo. This was Wollstonecraft's first