 |
| (Left excerpt is from a panel from Wollstonecraft's Original stories painted by William Blake. Right image is a portrait of Wollstonecraft by John Opie.) |
Alert attentive
eyes and a sanguine expression. The eyes of an optimistic observer.
John Opie painted a very comely portrait of Mary Wollstonecraft, acknowledging her elevated social status by having her engaged in the act of reading, her right hand turning the page of some unknown book. A scene typically reserved for men of intellect since it was popularly assumed that intellect was a thing reserved for men.1
John Opie painted a very comely portrait of Mary Wollstonecraft, acknowledging her elevated social status by having her engaged in the act of reading, her right hand turning the page of some unknown book. A scene typically reserved for men of intellect since it was popularly assumed that intellect was a thing reserved for men.1
Perhaps more
powerful though, is the gaze, which is not averted to the side but rather fixed
towards the viewer, suggesting the power to counter-gaze. Hers were eyes that
defied.
Wary eyes that have gazed into the dark night as she lay in front of her mother's door, ready for her father's alcohol soaked rage. Worried eyes that witnessed her sister Eliza driven mad by that cold Mr. Bishop.2 Drowned eyes that saw the tumultuous sea thrash on her voyage to Portugal while she was en route to take care of her terminally ill friend. Sad eyes that looked upon her daughter, Fanny, as the pair travelled across the country alone to find the man who abandoned them.3 Opie paints a very agreeable portrait of Mary, and one that conveys her beauty, but it is a description of her life that will convey the sublime, what life had carved into her mind and her observations.
Perhaps Opie’s
painting was a retrospective of a younger Mary. One spared of some of life’s
deeper blows. When her expression would have been much more relaxed.
Her future husband William Godwin described the event,
Her future husband William Godwin described the event,
“The situation in which Mary was introduced to
her, bore a resemblance to the first interview of Werter with Charlotte. She
was conducted to the door of a small house, but furnished with peculiar
neatness and propriety. The first object that caught her sight, was a young
woman of a slender and elegant form, and eighteen years of age, busily employed
in feeding and managing some children, born of the same parents, but
considerably inferior to her in age. The impression Mary received from this
spectacle was indelible; and, before the interview was concluded, she had
taken, in her heart, the vows of an eternal friendship."5
Their friendship
nourished Mary’s life and inspired her to learn and grow, recognizing the
shortcomings of her own education. Godwin says,
“Mary found Fanny's letters better spelt and
better indited than her own, and felt herself abashed. She had hitherto paid
but a superficial attention to literature. She had read, to gratify the ardour
of an inextinguishable thirst of knowledge; but she had not thought of writing
as an art. Her ambition to excel was now awakened, and she applied herself with
passion and earnestness. Fanny undertook to be her instructor; and, so far as
related to accuracy and method, her lessons were given with considerable
skill.”6
They were separated though for some time after Mary’s wanderlust father dragged them across England once again, seeing another home shrink into the distance, her eyes adjusting to the sight of new surroundings.
To earn a living, she would live with and attend to the needs of the thorny Mrs. Dawson from age nineteen to twenty, before having to come home to be close to her dying mother.7
Elizabeth Dixon Wollstonecraft took a tyrannical approach to her mothering in fear of what the world had in store. She thought educating her daughters using methods of fear would cow them into their roles as women. Mary got the worst of it, though after subsequent children, Elizabeth softened her approach.8
But it must be admitted that despite her style, she did raise many children from infancy into adulthood, in a time when many complications could arise in between pregnancy and those crucial infant years. Now though, she had served her role as mother and endured her role as victim so here was her time to pass. Before her final breath she spoke to her family, “A little Patience, and all will be Over.’ and these words are repeatedly referred to by Mary in the course of her writings."9
Shortly after her mother passed, her father would worsen until the whole household dissolved scattering the children to the wind, leaving Mary afloat and unbound till she drifted toward the door of dear Fanny Blood.
The most sensitive of the Wollstonecraft sisters Eliza, who inherited her mother’s name, would like her mother marry a quick-tempered hypocrite, Mr. Bishop. After Eliza’s health started deteriorating Mary employed herself as her sister’s nurse only to learn of the extent of Mr. Bishop’s cruelty. She would cast him in her book The Wrongs of Woman addressing him in the preface to her book, “I should despise, or rather call her an ordinary woman, who could endure such a husband as I have sketched.” 11
And almost as if
fated, her third deprivation of a friend was of Fanny, when her husband found
opportunity in Lisbon, Portugal. Fanny was ill at the time but was assured that
the southern climate would help her condition, though she got worse and sent
word to Mary of her dire straits. She had asked if Mary might visit her in her
hour of need. A call Mary would always heed. And though it would mean dooming
the school she had labored so long to establish, she spent coin to trek alone
across the sea to see what her friend had become,
 |
| From Wollstonecraft's Original Stories. A panel painted by the poet William Blake. |
Ten years later she
would reflect on the death of Fanny in her Letters from Sweden, Norway and
Denmark,
“The grave has closed over a dear friend, the friend of my youth. Still she is present with me, and I hear her soft voice warbling as I stray over the heath. Fate has separated me from another, the fire of whose eyes, tempered by infantine tenderness, still warms my breast; even when gazing on these tremendous cliffs sublime emotions absorb my soul.”13
“The grave has closed over a dear friend, the friend of my youth. Still she is present with me, and I hear her soft voice warbling as I stray over the heath. Fate has separated me from another, the fire of whose eyes, tempered by infantine tenderness, still warms my breast; even when gazing on these tremendous cliffs sublime emotions absorb my soul.”13
She came back to England from Portugal after Fanny's death to
find the school financially unwieldy, so she dropped it to pick up a lighter pen.
Equipped with experience, she sought to teach young women to Reason for
themselves,. She wrote her Thoughts on
the Education of Daughters (1787) and continued to write as much as she
read: letters, memorandums, educational treatises, the news, novels and her
seminal work A Vindication of the Rights
of Woman (1792.)
Below are a couple excerpts selected and performed from A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, and more may be posted. The song's descriptions have the script if you would like to read along. And I'll leave this link right here [o=o].
Below are a couple excerpts selected and performed from A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, and more may be posted. The song's descriptions have the script if you would like to read along. And I'll leave this link right here [o=o].
Throughout her
life, Mary had been subject to impatient patriarchs and seen her mother, sister
and closest friend all withered from maladies of the body and mind. As an
outsider, she not only noticed how man oppressed woman, but also the ways in
which that woman oppressed herself. She argued that women were given an
inferior education and that because of this failed to strive for higher
understanding, preferring more immediate distractions that tended to consist of
luxuries or sentimental romance fictions written by men with superficial
opinions of women.
So here’s where she stood, staring at a world full of foolish girls succumbing to the hubris of their husbands. And while she recognized the exceptional people to this rule; there was no unseeing the patriarch’s patterns. Mary’s opinions would evolve to contrast her parents, her peers, and by extension, society at whole. Her refuge would be among the literary circles where she would meet with Joseph Johnson who would publish so many of her works. And though she had already met William Godwin, it wasn’t until later in life a romance would bloom, one borne of intellect and respect.
So here’s where she stood, staring at a world full of foolish girls succumbing to the hubris of their husbands. And while she recognized the exceptional people to this rule; there was no unseeing the patriarch’s patterns. Mary’s opinions would evolve to contrast her parents, her peers, and by extension, society at whole. Her refuge would be among the literary circles where she would meet with Joseph Johnson who would publish so many of her works. And though she had already met William Godwin, it wasn’t until later in life a romance would bloom, one borne of intellect and respect.
Her writings gave
her status and the new society she associated herself with, “nourished her understanding, and enlarged her
mind. The French revolution, while it gave a fundamental shock to the human
intellect through every region of the globe, did not fail to produce a
conspicuous effect in the progress of Mary's reflections,” says Godwin.15
This is what tended
to happen, her world around her would fall apart and Mary would watch how it
broke apart. She was able to endure by having
 |
| William Blake's Newton and John Opie's Portrait of Wollstone craft. The hand holds the tools of reason. |
Enjoy the rest of
the exhibit and follow the citations if you want to go down the rabbit hole and
learn more. Every quote is an excerpt from a larger piece that tells a story
greater in scope. My selections leave out ambiguous sentiments that I was
afraid would distract from her overall points. And I left out many crucial
events in the latter part of her life.
I left out details
about her failed suicide attempts and both children born out of wedlock and a perilous incident involving her being on a sinking ship, and so I brought them up
briefly now to spark your interest. And then there’s the things we’ll never
know. What did Fanny Blood look like, and her namesake Fanny Imlay, first
daughter of Mary. But be most wary of the things you think you know. Recognize that there is a frame to this portrait and
that outside of it; there is more to see.
Letters to and from Mary with the people in her life
Below is an album that won the 1998 Grammy for Best Album of the Year. It explores many of the themes of motherhood, love and opportunity that Mary Wollstonecraft touched on in her works. Fun fact, they have the same birthday. Go figure.
Footnotes
Chapter 1 in Pennell’s Life of Mary Wollstonecraft. Kindle
Location 262. Because many of the sources are typed transcriptions of printed
text with no reference to page number or paragraph number, the footnotes referring
to electronic sources will often use Kindle Location referring to the
approximate location within the file that the quote may be found, assuming that
file was downloaded from the same source, via Gutenberg Project. However, by
using the search function to find key words, it should be easy enough to find
the referred information within the electronic document, even when downloaded
from a different source unless it is a physical scan of a printed text. 2
Chapter 2 in Pennell’s Life
of Mary Wollstonecraft. About half way in the chapter.3
Chapter 1 in Pennell’s Life
of Mary Wollstonecraft.4
Chapter 2 “1775-1783” in William Godwin’s Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication ofthe Rights of Woman. Kindle Location 123.5
Chapter 2 in Godwin’s Memoirs. Kindle Location 135.6
Chapter 2 in Pennell’s Life
of Mary Wollstonecraft. Kindle Location 400.7
Chapter 1 in Pennell’s Life
of Mary Wollstonecraft. Kindle Location 201.8
Chapter 2 in Godwin’s Memoirs. Kindle Location 165.9
Chapter 2 in Pennell’s Life
of Mary Wollstonecraft. Kindle Location 447.10
Introduction of Mary Wollstonecraft’s Maria. Kindle Location 71.11
Chapter 2 in Pennell’s Life
of Mary Wollstonecraft. Kindle Location 739.12
Letter VI in Wollstonecraft’s Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway and Denmark.
Kindle Location 665.13
Chapter 6 in Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. Kindle Location 2125.14
Chapter 6 in Godwin’s Memoir.
Kindle Location 396.15
Chapter 3 in Godwin’s Memoir.
Kindle Location 218.16
Works Cited
Anonymous Admirer. Letter to Godwin from an Admirer. Ed. William Godwin. Liverpool:, Nov 1800. Print.
Blake, William. "Newton." (1804)Print.
Elizabeth Robins Pennell. The Life of Mary Wollstonecraft. Kindle Edition ed. https://archive.org/details/lifeofmarywollst00pennrich: Roberts Brothers, 1884. Print.
Godwin, William. Letter from William Godwin to Shelley. Ed. Percy Shelley. A letter urging Shelley to keep Fanny Imlay's suicide discreet. Vol. , 13 Oct 1816. Print.
---. Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication of the Rights of Woman. Kindle ed. Johnson, Joseph, 1798. Print.
Imlay, Fanny. Letter to the Shelleys from Mary's Sister Fanny. Eds. Mary Shelley and Percy Shelley. Photographic Scan Vol. London:, May 29, 1816. Print.
---. Letter to the Shelleys from Mary's Sister Fanny. Eds. Mary Shelley and Percy Shelley. Written Text Vol. London:, May 29, 1816. Print.
Northcote, James. "Portrait of William Godwin." (1802)Print.
Opie, John. Portrait of Mary Wollstonecraft. 1790-1. , Wikimedia.org.
"Portrait of Mary Wollstonecraft (Mrs. William Godwin)." http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/opie-mary-wollstonecraft-mrs-william-godwin-n01167. 2004. Web.
Rothwell, Richard. Portrait of Mary Shelley. 1899. National Portrait Gallery, London.
Sharp, William after Haughton the Elder, Moses. Portrait of Joseph Johnson.
Wollstonecraft, Mary. Letters Written during a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway and Denmark. Kindle ed., 1795. Print.
---. "Maria; Or the Wrongs of Woman." (1798)Print.
---. Mary Wollstonecraft's Last Three Notes to Godwin. Ed. William Godwin. "In her final note, Mary Wollstonecraft half-quotes her mother's last words: ‘Have a little patience, and all will be over'. Her own daughter, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (later Mary Shelley), was born a few hours afterwards. (TRUNCATED) Vol. London:, August 30, 1797. Print.
---. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman; with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects. Kindle Edition ed. Gutenberg.org: Project Gutenberg, 1792. Web.
Yo, anyone trying to discuss some Wollstonecraft over here? Cos' lemme tell ya, I got an opinion or two.
ReplyDeleteI really liked the way you merged poetic language throughout the article instead of just giving straight facts. When you wrote about the different gazes Mary's eyes had in the painting, it really drew me in and made me want to read more sentences like that. We read plays by Sophocles this year and one such play, Antigone, is about a young girl who stands up for what she believes in and goes against her fellow neighbors by going against the law. She reminds me of Mary Wollstonecraft because they both decided to hold their values above everyone else's and do what they believed was right. I do have a question about how you decided to organize your writing since, to me, it seems to bounce back and forth. However, your article was really enjoyable :)
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteWhat law did Antigone subvert in her story? Lysistrata is a play by one of Sophocles' contemporaries that I read and acted in a 2013 production. She too had to rebel against the behaviors of not only Athenian men but also her fellow woman, rallying them to protest the senseless violence of the Peloponnesian War. Funny how such very old plays house female protagonists that deal with problems that are both ancient and contemporary.
Delete"Lysistrata: Ah, Calonice, my heart aches: I'm so annoyed at us women. For among men we have a reputation for sly trickery-
Calonice: And rightly too, on my word!"
(Lines 11-15 from Charle T. Murphy's translation of Arisophanes' Lysistrata)
Mary Wollstonecraft too held exceptional beliefs. Exceptional because they were not widely shared by her peers, which must have been very frustrating. I suppose you might compare Calonice with Eliza, for they both tend to embody the good wife.
But to answer your question, I grew this essay from a writing exercise given in class. We wrote a stream of thought entry describing the image of our characters and I felt myself lingering on the expression of her eyes since it was painted so well. And then it became about what her eyes had seen, key events that I fleshed out. I tend to write in fragments for a disorienting effect, but it's equally possible those bounces you feel are the sutures in between trains of thoughts. Sometimes I had to cut off an idea in order to relate it back to the core point creating some bumps in transition. Do you have any specific transitions that caught your attention?
Also, I'm curious as to your opinion on any of the audio on the blog. I noticed a lack of commentary on that and was wondering if it the links were working and such, or if they tended to distract from the overall piece. I'm glad you enjoyed the piece though and hope it created a strong image of Mary Wollstonecraft in your mind.
Antigone was from the three Theban plays by Sophocles and in her story, to keep it short, her two brothers fight one another in opposing armies. One fights for his homeland and the other has been declared a traitor and is defending the enemy. Polynices is the traitor and when both brothers die by each other's hands, Eteocles, the brother who defended his homeland, is buried with the traditional ritual while Polynices is left out in the open, unburied and no ritual is to be provided. Antigone disagrees with the law and the townsfolk who do nothing to properly lay Polynices to rest. So, she takes matters into her own hands and buries him, resulting in her death. I compared Antigone to Mary because they both went against their society's views. Mary believed that women are equal to men and fought for her cause, while Antigone believed in the Gods and wanted to follow the proper burying ritual for her family. In addition, since Antigone is a girl it is underline in he play that people believe she is weak and uncultured, which was a common stereotype. I hope this made sense.
DeleteI just reread your article and one transition that threw me off a little the first time I read it was when you jumped from Mary reading Franny's letters to the school that she left behind because the school was a minor detail in the paragraphs prior. However, that doesn't take away from the article. As for the audio I completely forgot to comment regarding how I liked it. I listened to them after I read the article and they made the reading more interactive which was a nice touch. The links see to be working fine.
Oh wow, yeah it sounds like Antigone and Mary both had a strong sense of morality that came from within themselves. And they don't just speak out, but are willing to put physical effort into achieving their goals. And these are very young people too.
DeleteI'm sure the male Athenian audiences who saw the first performances of Lysistrata and Antigone would have thought those two to be incredibly absurd characters because Antigone would be seen as a brat and Lysistrata as an insurrectionist, but now, seeing them as a modern audience, we get a completely different sense of who they were, brave people. And that's what Mary was too.
Oh! And I see what you mean. Chronologically, she goes back to England from Portugal after seeing Fanny, to find her school in financial strain. So it happened soon after the letter, but yeah, that needs a little sprucing to give the transition more context. Thanks so much for the feedback.
Just edited it.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI think it was an amazing idea to not just start off your article with facts about her accomplishments. Instead you started with her childhood and how she didn't react the same way that all of the other girls her age did to their predicament. She decided to change the way her life was and further pursue her education and follow what she believed in. This year I read about Scout Finch from To Kill A Mockingbird, and i can see some similarities between her and Mary Wollstonecraft. Scout didn't act the same way as the other girls her age but she stuck to her beliefs and let those guide her just like Mary did. I do wonder what captured your attention about Mary Wollstonecraft enough to write about her?
ReplyDelete-Tiffany
It's been a long time since I've read To Kill a Mockingbird. I'm currently online trying to refresh my memory using quotes and flash facts, but already I see a lot of crossover. Scout too was a very keen and inquisitive observer, and it's interesting that her teacher wasn't thrilled to see she had already learned to read under her father. It reminds me of a quote from Tom Stoppard's Arcadia in which the lady says to the learning girl, "We must have you married before you are educated beyond eligibility."
DeleteThere's a miseducation that Scout, Mary and Thomasina from Arcadia share. Yet they see past that and continue their individual pursuits for knowledge.
Oh right, there was a question. What captured my attention? Well I'm a big fan of her daughter Mary Shelley. She wrote Frankenstein which has become my Hamlet. My first instinct was to do a piece on Shelley but I realized that it would be more valuable to go further back and see where the young science fiction writer came from. Sadly, they never had a personal connection. They were severed shortly after the moment of birth, so whatever impressions the younger Mary had were from descriptions from those who survived Wollstonecraft or her own writings. And perhaps this underlying tragedy is what drove me to try and represent her, if not fully, than faithfully.
At the beginning of this year, I learned about Mary Wollstonecraft in my AP European History class. For that particular assignment, i had to become her and discuss her values with other philosophical thinkers. Although I knew about her sad history regarding her strict mother and abusive father, only after reading your article did i truly begin to sympathize with her and understand why she would want to fight for womens rights. I really love how you didn't only write cold hard facts, rather you wrote details about her that made me personally sympathize with her. The way you analyzed the painting was also very interesting as it is not often that a person will analyze a person through a portrait. It was a very symbolic presentation which I enjoyed reading. When you were writing this article, was one of your goals to make the reader sympathize with Mary or to give background information on what factors might have motivated her. Similarly to Jojo, I wanted to know if there was a reason why you organized your writing like how you did, as it made me have to reread some parts.
ReplyDeleteI didn't design any parts to be reread consciously, so I'm sure those instances are shortcomings in my writing. I'd very much like to know which parts were confusing just for future reference. I tend to ramble in my writings and work in revisions to give it some semblance of sanity.
DeleteAnd I mean yes, I definitely wanted to give background to inform the reader and add sympathetic elements so that you, the reader, might become emotionally invested, but those are more tools to go about achieving the overarching goals, firstly, to gain a sincere and strong impression of who Mary Wollstonecraft so that you might do further research at a later date, and secondly, to challenge the reader's consumption of information by pointing out the limitations of the essay.
My understanding of who she is is a painting I have in my head from all this concentrated information and colorful insights. This day and age we tend to be satisfied with an impression of a character or a story, but Mary Wollstonecraft isn't just an entry in a blog. She's a collection of intelligent books. A mirror for the modern woman to see herself among the trees. An essence that escapes the body. That might seem flowery but that was the aim and the goal. To try and communicate her.
You used the word "become" earlier. That word is very charged for me. I think a reader becomes a character the same way an actor becomes a character. It's up for the writer to design a medium that allows that to happen organically.
I like how you began the piece with more of a story rather than the basic facts like date of birth and other basic starter information. You engaged the reader right away with interesting information about her personal life. The facts at the end absolutely did intrigue me, however it sort of seemed like you realized you had to add those last minute, but I understand what you were going for. Overall a good read.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you enjoyed it. I didn't add those facts last minute, but I think I sense what you sense. I think there are several components that are awkward or clunky in this piece and part of that was due to poor scheduling on constructing anything. Indeed, you might say half of this essay I realized I had to add last minute.
DeleteThis will seem like an excuse, but truly, I spent too much of my time on the bells and whistles rather than ironing out the raw content. Judging from the overall response, it doesn't seem like audio made a huge effect in the experience and a great deal of time was spent editing two audio pieces and actor and I produced.
With pieces like this, it's important to prioritize what you want to get done, and even though having a killer playlist is nice, it doesn't really matter if it aint getting played. The written content was the primary feature so it should have had top priority.
Out of curiosity, did you hear any of the audio?
The eyes of Mary Wollstonecraft tells all: her defiance, her fixed attention on the viewer; it simply screams determination but also invokes a somber anecdote of her young life filled with hardships. By choosing to introduce the esteemed feminist through her perspective, it creates a narrative too intriguing to look away from. The poetic descriptions of her life as a young child make a fluid transition towards the historical context and impact of her works, a stunning technique that makes me sympathize more with her circumstances; however, the factual evidence should not be ignored. The excerpt is filled with examples of her work, her developing ideas that resulted from her situations, and even to modern influence with Lauryn Hill's "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill", a soulful take on themes Wollstonecraft had shared in her works. Wollstonecraft's steadfast goal and belief on women's rights and education brings to mind two figures of literature and feminism: Scout Finch, and Malala Yousafzai. Scout, the narrator of the novel, "To Kill a Mockingbird," demonstrates her defiance towards stereotypical roles that women possessed in her hometown Maycomb County. Despite this, Scout adheres to her beliefs and takes her own path towards what she believes in. Similar as well, Malala's journey, narrated in "I Am Malala," describe her fight for girls' education at a young age, where Wollstonecraft places importance on education, as it hinders the women from realizing their capabilities. How was it researching and creating such an in-depth outlook on the painting, along with even reaching out to modern sources to show her influence?
ReplyDeleteAll of the materials were super accessible because they're in the public domain, however, using only electronic sources required adapting my workflow. Usually I have a bunch of a books and printed out articles that I annotate with sticky notes and highlighters and even though that can disorganized too, the tactile nature of paper makes it easier to navigate the text.
DeleteE text can be very frustrating because for these versions, I had no page numbers to refer to when citing so I had to do Kindle locations, which doesn't look familiar to most people. And pages can be reformatted and there are risks of typos, but the majority is transcribed well and the search function is so helpful when trying to find quotes and mentions of specific things.
I tried to use primary sources as much as possible because the characters in this story were such articulate people that having them speak would build their world much more efficiently than me trying to imitate them or obtusely exposit a bunch of details. It's an advantage that this character had that others like Sojourner Truth researcher's don't have the advantage of since Truth was illiterate and didn't produce any written works. All accounts of Truth's speeches are second hand and filtered through the perspective of a completely different human.
As for the referencing of modern examples, that was to try and reduce the temporal separation we tend to feel when reading "historical" characters. In my experience, once you go back far enough where pictures become portraits, it's easy to feel like those people were almost fiction. It's like that weird separation that happens when you realize that Martin Luther King and Anne Frank were born the same year. So I wanted the story elements of motherhood, education and rebellion to take a modern form and that hip hop album popped up in a series of tangential searches so I had to plug it in. It's just so solid and thankfully swear free. Finding swear free songs was one of the most time consuming things in building that playlist hahah.
I'm hopping on the Wollstonecraft train! I love this lady so much. I had to LARP as her in European History, so I'm quite familiar with her troubled yet brilliant mind and spirit. Let me just say that I fricking loved this part: "A scene typically reserved for men of intellect since it was popularly assumed that intellect was a thing reserved for men." It was so clever! I have to relate this back to something I've read in school, so I'm just going to relate it back to Malala. Malala Yousafzai, like Wollstonecraft, is/was a women's rights activist, with a spirit as tough as Wollstonecrafts. Malala took a bullet to the head and kept on keeping on, and Wollstonecraft took a patriarchal bullet to her sanity, and did the same. I just wanted to ask, what gave you the idea to include music in your blog?
ReplyDeleteIn digital media, we have a ton of visual and audio tools to convey a story, and when conveying a story, nothing creates emotional investment like music. It seems to communicate more than language can sometimes, but at any rate, it certainly creates a stronger impression. You can remember anything if you put it in a song. I saw an ad for a comedy stand up on youtube and in it the comedian admitted to being a bigger Jay Z fan than a Martin Luther King fan. And he said something along the lines of, "I know every single Jay Z song. I only know like four bars from that I Had a Dream speech."
DeleteWhat was the question again?
Why include music? Because I like picking the music when I'm in the car, and as long as the songs are unobtrusive and serve the story instead of distracting from it, then I like to include music whenever possible. But I think having a pause button is important because you can't appeal to everyone unfortunately.
Including the tragedies of Mary Wollstonecraft's past makes this work very powerful. Like several previous commenters, I first learned of Wollestonecraft as another name from the European Enlightenment. I thought it was very interesting to examine someone's life in terms of their relationships, as you did, as they can reveal many characteristics about a person. I have a few questions about your research regarding this part. How would you go about researching primary sources? Would you say the process of using information from first-hand accounts, such as letters from people who knew Wollstonecraft personally, is different from referring to a generalized summary? That is, do you have to analyze and interpret it yourself, rather than paraphrasing an already written explanantion?
ReplyDeleteI can relate to Wollstonecraft's interests in reading and writing. Wollstonecraft reminds me of Malala Yousafzai. Her biography, I Am Malala, details her experiences with campaigning for girls' education in her home country and around the world. Similarly, Wollstonecraft was a literate female intellectual in a time when "intellect was... reserved for men."
For researching primary sources, I find it is most simple to find a well researched book on the topic. There are many talented minds that have already mined elaborate tunnels in history to piece together some semblance of a story. For me, I read a biography on Mary Wollstonecraft written by Elizabeth Pennell. Pennell used Godwin's texts but also cited many letters and alluded to other regions of literature such as the Greek myths. This gave me many leads for primary sources. Also, there just happened to be a lot of available texts in the public domain that were easy enough to find.
DeleteAnd yes, there's definitely a difference in using first hand accounts to secondary sources. There is a level of interpretation and deep reading that has to be done because of the verbosity and the way language is used, but I found that these writings were articulate, contemporary and universal enough to read without too much of a lens. When it comes to Shakespeare, or texts written in a foreign language, it's sometimes necessary to have a guide or translators help the reader navigate the text. But depending on the function of your writing, if you have access and can read the primary material, I'd say rely on that as your strong supporting material and use the secondary sources to bounce ideas around.
Come to think of it, if you ever wanted to do a project on Wollstonecraft, you could always come back to this place to find where I got my resources. Often times, finding the sources isn't the hard part. It's differentiating weak sources from strong sources that's important. This blog is a good start, but you'd definitely want way more if you wanted to create something like this that's your own.
DeleteHi Nick. Thanks for the advice on researching and using different types of sources! I've read many nonfiction, research-backed books, but never thought to look too deeply into the sources. Your work, with the extensive and effective references to primary sources, however, prompted me to think about how I would do the same thing for something I want to write or learn about.
DeleteYour writing style left drew me into the story and kept me into the story until the end. Rather than deliver the information cold your wrote into a way the readers could sympathize with her situation, and makes her overall actions more understandable. Wollstonecraft reminds me of the many debatably strong female protagonists I've read about this year. Of those there was Scout Finch from "To Kill a Mockingbird," and Malala Yousafzai, who both defied the traditional gender roles of their time period and environment though they faced repercussions.
ReplyDeleteFrom your mass amount of researched books and articles, I'm wondering if you've went on a research binge before hand or had a prior interest in Wollstonecraft before writing your article.
Before this, I only knew of Wollstonecraft from her daughter Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley who wrote Frankenstein. Frankenstein is a hugely influential text for me, so when I saw Wollstonecraft on the list I pretty much immediately called dibs. I'd definitely describe it the research process for this project as a binge because it was highly concentrated to the point of being unwieldy at times. I wish I premeditated a process or some approach to make organizing the information and my references more efficient. I feel like there was a lot of wasted time bouncing between texts and losing my place.
DeleteThis piece of writing was incredibly interesting towards the middle and through the end. Mary Wollstonecraft is someone my history class spoke about a lot this year. I had always found myself amazed by the things she was able to do despite the restrictions of her time. Your ability to easily transition into each new topic is something I find very admirable.
ReplyDeleteI was able to connect this story to the story "I Am Malala", because Malala Yousafzai is someone who risked her life to be able to defend women's rights. Alike to Malala, Mary was able to speak out about what she wanted! I loved being able to connect these two women through your writing. I do wonder what made you choose to write about Mary? There are many other amazing women and I'd love to know about the inspiration that lead you to write about her.
This is Melanie Sar! I'm not sure why it won't let me create an account with Google+.
DeleteThis is Melanie Sar! I'm not sure why it won't let me create an account with Google+.
DeleteI'm a huge fan of her daughter Mary Shelley who wrote Frankenstein. I think Wollstonecraft is more influential in the popular conscience than is easily imaginable. And also I thought the name Wollstonecraft was really pretty. It kind of reminded my of that scooby doo movie where they solve the crime about witches with wiccans who were in this weird like vampire band.
DeleteSo yeah, if I'm being completely honest, I picked Wollstonecraft because she reminded me of Frankenstein and Scooby Doo.
I find the way you formatted this article to be quite stupendous. You illustrated Mary Wollstonecraft as a person, rather than a dump truck of facts. This setup makes it easy to sympathize with her as a person, considering it has a one-on-one feel to it.
ReplyDeleteA similar lady to Mary would be Malala from "I Am Malala." Both her and Mary fought for women's rights. More specifically, female education. Malala viewed education as a sacred gift and something fun to do. Mary figured that education was important in the quest of unlocking a woman's full potential.
Along with seemingly everyone else, I am also quite curious on why you decided to set up your article like this. I quite enjoy it, nonetheless.
- Val
As far as structure goes, I knew I wanted to start from describing the portrait, then go into some specific scenes to flesh out her character and then try to circle back to the idea of the portrait and attempting to frame a person and capture them in a certain light. After beginning it, I knew I wanted to focus on her friendship with Fanny because she has a nice piece in Vindication of the Rights of Woman that talks about valuing friendship over that kind of love found in sentimental romances. I had an actor perform that section (unedited because it was so colorful and self-supporting) and after hearing it I knew that I wanted to focus on a lot of the aromantic relationships in her life.
DeleteSo a lot of that middle region is focusing on those relationships and trying to roughly segue them together and mention these other multimedia aspects. Also I just Malala's name featured on Hulu. It seems like there's a quality movie out now. Might check it out myself given the strong connections everyone has made between them.
Ah alright. I applaud you on your setup, it gives it a nice feel. I do enjoy how you focused on her aromantic relationships, I find those quite interesting.
DeleteYeah, it is a documentary if I remember correctly and if we are talking about the same movie. It’s a good summary of the problems she faced and I think it covers some of what she has done.