Author of 2 great feminist works, A Serious Proposal to the Ladies (part 1 1694, part 2 1697) and Some Reflections Upon Marriage (1700), Mary Astell was the first self-avowed feminist writer in English. Although she wrote anonymously, her authorship was widely known. Daughter of Newcastle coal merchants, Astell never married and was supported throughout her life by a series of wealthy female friends.

      In Proposal, Astell tries to extend women's career options beyond mother and nun, a not very likely option in Protestant England. Astell proposes a new type of institution for women, an institution much like a secular convent, a place where women could go to live, study, learn, and teach.

      In Marriage, Astell analyzes marriage from a woman's perspective, specifically the difficulty of finding a suitable mate. She describes many of the tricks that men use to ensnare women into marriage and discusses the pitfalls of many of the methods that women use to discern the true character of their potential mate. Astell concludes that there is no reliable method that women can use to ensure that they marry descent, responsible, kind, considerate, loving men.

      From Some Reflections Upon Marriage:

      "But how can a Woman scruple entire Subjection, how can she forbear to affirm the Worth and Excellency of the Superior Sex, if she at all considers it! Have not all the great Actions that have been performed in the World been done by Men? Have they not founded Empires and over-turned them? Do they not make Laws and continually repeal and amend them? Their vast Minds lay Kingdoms waste, no Bounds or Measures can be prescribed to their Desires. War and Peace depend on them; they form Cabals and have the Wisdom and Courage to get over all the rubs, the petty Restraints which Honor and Conscience may lay in the way of their desired Grandeur. What is it they cannot do? They make Worlds and ruin them, form Systems of universal Nature, and dispute eternally about them; their Pen gives Worth to the most trifling Controversy; not can a Fray be inconsiderable if they have drawn their Swords in't. All that the wise Man pronounces if an oracle, and every Word the Witty speaks, a Jest. It is a Woman's Happiness to hear, admire and praise them, especially if a little Ill-nature keeps them at any time from bestowing the Applauses to each other! And if she aspires no further, she is thought to be in her proper Sphere of Action, she is as wise and as good as can be expected from her!" pages 59-60

Recommended Readings:

      * used in preparation of this document

      * Mary Astell, Some Reflections Upon Marriage, [NY: Source Book Press, 1970]

      Mary Astell, Patricia Springborg (Editor), Astell : Political Writings (Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought) [Cambridge Univ Pr, 1996]

      Mary Astell, Serious Proposal to the Ladies, parts 1 and 2 [Pickering & Chatto 1997]

      * Moria Ferguson, First Feminists: British Women Writers 1578 - 1799 [Bloomington, In: Indiana University Press, 1985] (excertps of Proposal and Marriage)

      Ruth Perry, Celebrated Mary Astell - An Early English Feminist [Chicago: U. of Chicago Press, 1986] (biography)

      Biography of Mary Astell

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