Mary Wollstonecraft
Pioneer of Women's Rights · April 27, 1759, Spitalfields, London, England - September 10, 1797, London, England
A writer and philosopher who published one of the earliest works of feminist philosophy, "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman" (1792), arguing that women are not naturally inferior to men and deserve the same education. She died at 38 from complications of childbirth, having given birth to the future Mary Shelley.
Life and legacy
Mary Wollstonecraft was born into a family of declining fortunes. Her father squandered an inheritance and was abusive, experiences that gave her a lifelong sensitivity to the powerlessness of women in a patriarchal society. Largely self-educated, she worked as a governess, teacher, and companion before establishing herself as a professional writer in London's radical intellectual circles, centered around the publisher Joseph Johnson.
In 1790, Wollstonecraft published "A Vindication of the Rights of Men" in response to Edmund Burke's attack on the French Revolution, making her one of the first to challenge Burke in print. Two years later came her masterwork, "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman" (1792), a groundbreaking argument that women's apparent inferiority was not natural but the result of their limited education. She demanded that women receive the same rational education as men, arguing that this would make them better wives, mothers, and citizens, not rivals to men.
Wollstonecraft traveled to revolutionary Paris in 1792, where she witnessed the Reign of Terror and began a relationship with the American businessman Gilbert Imlay, with whom she had a daughter, Fanny. When Imlay abandoned her, she twice attempted suicide. She later formed a relationship with the philosopher William Godwin, and the two married in 1797 when Wollstonecraft became pregnant.
On August 30, 1797, Wollstonecraft gave birth to her second daughter, Mary, who would grow up to write "Frankenstein." Wollstonecraft died eleven days later of puerperal fever, a common and devastating consequence of childbirth in the era before antiseptic practice. She was just thirty-eight years old.
After her death, Godwin published a memoir revealing her love affairs and suicide attempts, which scandalized the public and damaged her reputation for decades. It was not until the twentieth century that Wollstonecraft was reclaimed as a foundational figure in feminist thought. Today she is recognized as one of the most important political philosophers of the Enlightenment era.
Key accomplishments
- Published "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman" (1792), a founding text of feminist philosophy
- Published "A Vindication of the Rights of Men" (1790), an early response to Edmund Burke
- Advocated for women's education as the key to equality
- Witnessed the French Revolution firsthand and wrote about it in "An Historical and Moral View of the French Revolution" (1794)
- Mother of Mary Shelley, author of "Frankenstein"
Quotes
I do not wish them to have power over men; but over themselves.
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792)
Strengthen the female mind by enlarging it, and there will be an end to blind obedience.
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792)