Maria Wollstonecraft's Treatment Of Women In Her Letters

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Recommended: Marriage in seventeenth-century England: the woman’s story

In this excerpt, Maria wants her daughter to know that she is the one whom she truly wants to educate, and to show her how to be strong in order to not be influenced and harmed by others, especially men. The fact that Maria’s daughter has not been given a name in the novel may mean that she can be seen as a representation of all young women of future generations. In that case, the conversation between Mary and her daughter is, in fact, a conversation between Wollstonecraft and all her female readers. Maria tries to inform her daughter on everything concerning a woman’s life, in an attempt to prepare her daughter for the miseries and injustices women experience, as well as to secure her happiness. Seemingly, Wollstonecraft argues that women …show more content…

Suggestively, Wollstonecraft felt that eighteenth-century marriages did not represent a partnership since within the marriage; men were legally superior to women. In addition, men often had the advantage of having the right to choose whom to marry, something that women rarely had. It is likely that Wollstonecraft considered that too many women entered marriage with feelings towards another person, making them choose duty over their own emotions. Accordingly, Wollstonecraft states in A Vindication of the Rights of …show more content…

The narrative examines the idea of alienation of women who transgress the social norms and attempt to maintain their own identity, even after marriage. Consequently, Wollstonecraft states: “a woman […] resigning what is termed her natural protector (though he never was so, but in name) is despised and shunned, for asserting the independence of mind distinctive of a rational being, and spurning at slavery” (1798: 117). This is a clear attack on the manner in which women were treated. Many women chose to leave their protectors and tried to assert their independence and freedom of choice. This proves problematic for Maria, however, as she and Mr. Venables were not divorced, she merely chose to separate from him illegally. In the eyes of the law, she is still a married woman and is, therefore, subjected to her

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