Mary Wollstonecraft & Her Legacy

Mary Wollstonecraft & Her Legacy

Following the Enlightenment, Mary Wollstonecraft wrote the feminist novel The Vindication of the Rights of Woman. In this novel she applied rights to females that had formerly been reserved to males, such as unalienable rights. Her novel impacted different areas of society. Wollstonecraft called for the advancement of women’s rights in areas such as education, work, and politics. She also proposes that women are just as capable as men and have a far greater purpose than simply to be pleasing to men. Her novel became a bestseller in the summer of 1792.1 After reading her novel, many women applied her views to their lives to the greatest extent possible in the time period in which they lived. Mary Wollstonecraft’s novel was the first major stand for women’s rights creating the feminist movement in Great Britain and consequently the Americas.

Mary Wollstonecraft effected the lives of many women. One significant woman that Mary Wollstonecraft had an effect on was Margaret Fuller. Margaret’s father, Timothy Fuller, had a need for an intellectual companion. Because he did not have a son as his first born, he gave Margaret an education intended only for males of the time. He was also an advocate for women’s rights, playing a major role in the development of Margaret’s feminist views she possessed later on in life.2 He used Wollstonecraft’s novel as a guide for Margaret’s education and instilled in Margaret that there are no limits to the female mind. Mr. Fuller pushed Margaret’s education to the limits, teaching her subjects intended for both women and men alike. He educated her about history and literature, topics thought good for a woman and useful when becoming a wife as well as teaching her top...

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Bibliography

1. Allen, Margaret Vanderhaar The Achievement of Margaret Fuller. London: The

Pennsylvania State University Press, 1979.

2. Capper, Charles. Margaret Fuller an American Romantic Life. Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 1992.

3. Fuller, Margaret. "Women in the Nineteenth Century."

<http://www.belmont.edu/Humanities/literature/English221/Fuller/fuller2.htm>

(3 March 2000).

4. Mitchell, David. The Fighting Pankhursts. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1967.

5. Rosen, Andrew. Rise Up Women!. London: Routeledge & Kegan Paul, 1974.

6. Rowbotham, Sheila. "A feminist voice across 200 years," The Independent, 4 June

1992, sec. Living Page.

7. Wade, Mason. Margaret Fuller: Whetstone of genius. New York: The Vicking Press,

1940.