Summary Of Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication Of The Rights Of Women

In Wollstonecraft’s radical essay, A Vindication of the Rights of Women, she discusses women’s issues including marriage and the right for an education equal to that of a man’s. A part of her argument for equal education is that women should have the right to develop their own form of reason without influence from other sources. The importance of developing reason is so that women will not be overly inclined towards emotionalism and develop superficial ways of thinking (46). Since women are uneducated they, unfortunately, blindly submit to men 's power. This leads to another of Wollstonecraft’s points: that marriage is a form of prostitution (48). Wollstonecraft was mocked in her time, but was later recognized as a founder of modern feminism.

In her family she learned from experience about the inequality between males and females. When she started working she had limitations because she was middle class and was not married. Wollstonecraft “worked as a paid companion in the fashionable resort of Bath, as a governess in an aristocratic family, and as the proprietor of a school” (“Mary Wollstonecraft”). During this time not only did she witness the inequality of education, but she also saw how many women there were in unhappy marriages and were powerless to do anything to solve their unhappiness. Wollstonecraft had little to no formal education and because of this she relied on self-education. This later led to why she spoke seriously about women having the ability to receive an equal education. Later in Wollstonecraft’s life she developed a first love that bloomed into a relationship with Gilbert Imlay, and from this an illegitimate daughter was born named Franny. In 1795 she attempted suicide. Wollstonecraft married William Godwin and had a legitimate child named Mary Shelley. The end of Wollstonecraft’s life was not ideal, in 1797 she died after complications from her daughter Mary Shelley’s