![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() With her sister and friend, she opened a day school for girls in Newington Green. An avid reader, frustrated by the limited education and career options open to girls, Wollstonecraft set out to educate herself. But we should also take pause when looking at how she is presented, especially when she is shown as the main representative of British feminism.īorn in 1759 in London to a middle-class family, Wollstonecraft spent her youth watching her mother suffer at the hands of an abusive father. Her public commemoration has ranged from the traditional blue plaque to a controversial sculpture in her old north London neighbourhood.Īs the author of an impassioned plea for human rights, and one of the earliest and most-read statements of feminism, Wollstonecraft today has a well-deserved status as a feminist icon. She even fell out of favour with some 20th-century feminists.īut in the last decade and a half, popular interest in her life and work has grown exponentially with the emergence of Wollstonecraft blogs, societies, campaigns and even Instagram and Facebook accounts in her name. ![]() She was dubbed a “hyena in a petticoat” by contemporary politician and writer Horace Walpole, accused of being “unsexed”, unladylike, and of having no shame. Though considered the mother of first-wave feminism, the 18th-century philosopher long endured her share of trolls refusing to take her seriously. Mary Wollstonecraft has had something of a revival in recent years. ![]()
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