A Vindication of the Rights of Women

After reading Wollstonecraft's essay, I was surprised I had never heard of her or her work in history class. She was extremely ahead of her time, and exceptionally thoughtful in analyzing the often sexist writings of French Revolutionary thinkers. What most impressed me about Wollstonecraft's essay was her fearlessness in stating her opinions. She often times used language that must have infuriated most men, and her essays were surely an important part of an early feminist movement.

Early in her essay, Wollstonecraft points out that women are taught from an early age that they are supposed to be gentle, amusing, and obedient of their husbands. The author primarily objects to this limited gender role, but also goes further to say that men employ this female characterization to enslave women, which is the basis of her essay. This was, especially for her time, a valid argument.

Wollstonecraft points out that women are deprived of a full formal education, but interestingly she argues that this, in some ways, better serves women's intelligence. Men are taught other people's ideas that are accepted as true, whereas women are left to observe and draw their own conclusions. In this fashion, men (and some women) believe that they are superior to women simply because they have been told so for generations. They fail to observe the sexes in an objective light; therefore, the accepted theory that women are inferior survives.

I was especially interested to read the author's opinion of what marriage should be. She explains that the ideal marriage is a mutual friendship, not a master-servant relationship. Wollstonecraft goes on to say that a marriage in which the spouses are best friends is a marriage that is much healthier and likely to last longer. When the women is forced to always attempt to please her husband, the relationship deteriorates. This holds true, even in present times.

On a whole, I found this essay the hardest to read, but also the most culturally significant. The dense text made the reading go much slower, but the essay was extremely forward-thinking for its time, so much so that Wollstonecraft also knew she had to convince women that they weren't inferior. We've come a long way...