Reading Order
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman Reading Order
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) by Mary Wollstonecraft is the founding text of modern feminist thought — a sustained argument, addressed primarily to Talleyrand, that women's apparent irrationality, vanity, and weakness are the products of their defective education and social condition, not of their nature, and that women are entitled to the same rational education and civil rights as men. Wollstonecraft's argument proceeds from Enlightenment premises: reason is the highest human faculty; human dignity depends on rational self-governance; the same arguments that justify the American and French Revolutions' claims for the rights of men apply equally to women. The book was written at extraordinary speed (Wollstonecraft reportedly wrote it standing up, sending each chapter to the printer as it was completed) and the prose is often rough and repetitive — but its argument is clear, powerful, and remarkably far-reaching. Wollstonecraft attacks not only the explicit educationalists who argued for female education limited to 'accomplishments' (Rousseau in Emile is her primary target) but also the sentimental literature that encouraged women to define themselves through their emotional relationships rather than their rational capacities. The book was written in 1792, before the Terror; its reception was transformed by Godwin's posthumous memoir of Wollstonecraft (1798), which revealed her unmarried relationships and illegitimate daughter, and it remained a stigmatized text until the suffragette movement reclaimed it in the nineteenth century.
Where to start
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) — the Oxford World's Classics edition edited by Miriam Brody (2008) is the standard scholarly edition; the Penguin Classics edition edited by Sylvana Tomaselli is also excellent. The first four chapters are the theoretical core; the later chapters (on specific aspects of female education) can be read more selectively. Reading alongside Rousseau's Emile (the primary target) gives the argument its sharpest context.
Complete A Vindication of the Rights of Woman Book List
- 1Buy
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (Oxford World's Classics)
Mary Wollstonecraft (ed. Miriam Brody)·2008·The standard scholarly edition — Brody's introduction is the best short account of Wollstonecraft's argument, its Enlightenment context, and its place in the history of feminist thought; essential notes on the targets of the argument (Rousseau, Dr. Gregory, Mrs. Chapone). - 2Buy
A Vindication of the Rights of Men
Mary Wollstonecraft·1790·Wollstonecraft's first major political work — a response to Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France; reading it before the Rights of Woman shows how Wollstonecraft arrived at her feminist argument from her prior commitments to democratic rights. - 3Buy
Mary Wollstonecraft: A Revolutionary Life
Janet Todd·2000·The standard modern biography — Todd's account of Wollstonecraft's life (the relationship with Fuseli, the illegitimate daughter Fanny, the relationship with Godwin, the death in childbirth giving birth to Mary Shelley) is essential for understanding the personal stakes of the argument. - 4Buy
The Wrongs of Woman; or, Maria
Mary Wollstonecraft·1798·Wollstonecraft's unfinished novel, published posthumously by Godwin — the fictional companion to the Vindication, in which a woman imprisoned in a madhouse by her husband illustrates the concrete consequences of women's lack of legal rights; essential reading with the Vindication. - 5Buy
The Subjection of Women
John Stuart Mill·1869·The philosophical sequel to Wollstonecraft in the liberal tradition — Mill's argument for women's legal equality, written with Harriet Taylor Mill, makes the same Enlightenment case as Wollstonecraft with seventy more years of evidence; the most important feminist philosophical text between Wollstonecraft and Simone de Beauvoir.
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman — Frequently Asked Questions
What is A Vindication of the Rights of Woman about?
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) by Mary Wollstonecraft argues that women's apparent irrationality, vanity, and weakness are the products of their defective education and social position, not of their nature. Women, like men, are rational beings capable of self-governance; therefore they are entitled to the same rational education and civil rights. Wollstonecraft's primary target is Rousseau's Emile (1762), which argued for an education for girls designed to make them pleasing to men rather than rational agents; she also attacks the sentimental literature that encouraged women to define themselves through their emotional relationships.
Why was A Vindication of the Rights of Woman stigmatized after publication?
A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) was initially received respectfully, if not universally approvingly. It was Godwin's Memoirs of the Author of 'A Vindication of the Rights of Woman' (1798), published after Wollstonecraft's death, that transformed the book's reception: Godwin revealed that Wollstonecraft had had an illegitimate daughter by Gilbert Imlay, had attempted suicide twice, and had lived with Godwin unmarried before their eventual marriage. This made her a target for conservatives who argued that her life proved the immorality of her principles. The book remained stigmatized for decades, until the suffragette movement of the nineteenth century reclaimed her as a founding figure.
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