A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

by Wollstonecraft, Mary

• ISBN13: 9780140433821
• ISBN10: 0140433821
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1993-02-01
• Publisher: Penguin Classics

Summary

The First Edition of this Norton Critical Edition was both an acclaimed classroom text and ahead of its time. This Second Edition offers the best in Wollstonecraft scholarship and criticism since 1976, providing the ideal means for studying the first feminist document written in English.

Table of Contents

Introduction
The Liberation of Mary Wollstonecraft--Life and Writings	1	(19)
`Bliss was it in that dawn . . .'--the Political Setting of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman	20	(5)
`A Woman's Place'--the Feminist Background to the Vindication	25	(12)
The `Feminist Manifesto'--the Argument of the Vindication	37	(21)
`Posterity will, however, be more just.'--Feminism after the Vindication	58	(7)
Mary Wollstonecraft at the Bicentennial of the Vindication	65	(26)
Further Reading	71	(4)
A Note on the Text	75	(4)
A VINDICATION OF THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN
Author's Introduction	79	(6)
Dedication	85	(6)
The Rights and Involved Duties of Mankind Considered	91	(9)
The Prevailing Opinion of a Sexual Character Discussed	100	(23)
The Same Subject Continued	123	(18)
Observations on the State of Degradation to which Woman is Reduced by Various Causes	141	(32)
Animadversions on Some of the Writers Who Have Rendered Women Objects of Pity, Bordering on Contempt	173	(46)
The Effect which an Early Association of Ideas Has upon the Character	219	(8)
Modesty--Comprehensively Considered, and Not as a Sexual Virtue	227	(13)
Morality Undermined by Sexual Notions of the Importance of a Good Reputation	240	(12)
Of the Pernicious Effects which Arise from the Unnatural Distinctions Established in Society	252	(12)
Parental Affection	264	(3)
Duty to Parents	267	(6)
On National Education	273	(27)
Some Instances of the Folly which the Ignorance of Women Generates; with Concluding Reflections on the Moral Improvement that a Revolution in Female Manners Might Naturally Be Expected to Produce	300