Born to a seventy-year-old father and thirty-year-old mother, Radcliffe inherited a considerable fortune from her father which was intrusted to 2 guardians upon her father’s death. Secretly courted and clandestinely married, Radcliffe would come to regret her impetuous decision. After having 7 children, 2 of whom died, Radcliffe found herself financially destitute. Her kindly, but unemployed, alcoholic husband had dissipated her fortune. After trying several alternatives, Radcliffe sent her sons away to school, left her daughters with her mother, and moved to London where she sold the last of the family possessions, the family silver.

      Forced to find gainful employment, a humiliating situation for which she was not prepared, Radcliffe eventually found a position as governess to a Scottish aristocratic family, her youngest daughter was sent out to learn dressmaking, and her husband took a position as steward. Mary Ann and her husband would never again live together again for any length of time.

      Moved by personal experiences, including a nervous collapse, Radcliffe wrote poetry where she described her experiences, loneliness and depression. Motivated by the plight of women around her, as well as, by her own financial needs, Radcliffe wrote her best known work, The Female Advocate: or, an attempt to recover the rights of woman from male usurpation (written in 1792, published in 1799), a ground-breaking analysis of women’s oppression. Linking women’s oppression with women’s limited economic horizons, Radcliffe railed against the men taking jobs in traditionally female occupations and observed that prostitution is often the only viable economic alternative women have to earn enough money to keep alive, a sharp break with the traditional belief that prostitution resulted only from women’s moral failings.

      From The Female Advocate

      “Let us then commence with a gentleman of small, independent fortune; for, as it is the general maxi through life, that every one should endeavor to outdo his neighbor, the gentleman also must keep up appearances for the benefit of his family (as he is pleased to term it); and, in the present day, where do we see the father or mother of a family, with an independent fortune, be it ever so small, who would not be shocked at the bare idea of placing their daughter in the world in such situations as would enable them to rise, through their own industry and merit, or fit them for becoming wives to some honest and industrious tradesman? - No: that would be a degradation which must not take place. It is the etiquette of the times for the daughters to be bred fine ladies, although it be without a fortune, either dependent or independent, to support it. As for trade, that is out of the question. The sons, indeed, are differently provided: the eldest, in course, inherits the paternal estates, and the younger ones are placed in the church, the army, the navy, or at the bar; and others, again, are genteelly situated in the mercantile world: the whole of which are fit professions for a gentleman, and by which, if they have merit and success, they may acquire a competency.

      But for the female part of the family, what appears in their favour? What prospects have they in live? - The parents die, and leave them, without a provision, a burden upon their connections; which forms the first step to deprive them of friends as well as subsistence. A miserable inheritance, to be their best and only portion! What can be said in behalf of such parents? Can their easy compliance with the fashion of the times form any apology for such mistaken conduct? - This surely cannot be called true parental affection, to entail upon these helpless young creatures such a succession of misery as must eventually ensue. . .

      . . . What was it brought ruin upon the first distressed female, who was admitted into the Magdalen charity; and what but a miracle led her to taste comfort?

      What numbers of helpless and destitute young women there are, who, seeing themselves neglected and despised by their connections, notwithstanding all the refined and delicate ideas which their education and mode of bringing up have possessed them with, would gladly endeavour, through necessity, to make up the deficiency of their parent’s neglect, by putting themselves forward in the world, in order to obtain a support. But, alas! To their sorrow, they quickly see it is not in their power; for, under their present circumstances, “the world is not their friend, nor the world’s laws;” and what was not effected by their parents, cannot possibly be obtained by an inexperienced young woman.

      . . . How far the wife was intended to be the slave to her husband, I know not; but certain we are, she was designed to be his friend, his companion, and united part; or, according to the gentleman’s phrase, his better part; and yet how often do we see her sinking under the burden of a household load, whilst the unfeeling husband is lavishing away the substance which ought to be the comfort and support of a family? Yet such unnatural beings there are, who, by giving way to some unlawful passion, can, without scruple or remorse, trample under foot all laws, divine and human, and with impunity bring wretchedness upon those he is bound to support: not withstanding St. Paul tells us, “if any one provide not for his own, and especially those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.”

      Let us but look at the many unhappy females, who come to ruin through mercenary marriages. How many are the instances of young women, who have been brought up in affluence, and reared with all the tender care and attention, which are in the power of maternal affection to bestow; yet, perhaps, through her youthful follies and credulity, she is led away by the artifice and false pretensions of those mercenary men, on whom she cheerfully bestows her patrimony, whether acquired by inheritance, r the smiles of fortune upon the honest industry of her deceased parents, avails not, for her expected happiness is vanished in empty air, and she is quickly exposed to all the ills of fate.

“O thoughtless mortals! Ever blind to fate,
“Too soon dejected, and too soon elate.
“Sudden their honours shall be snatch’d away,
“And doom’d for ever this victorious day.


      Pope

      But the justice of retribution taking place, shall we not see these poor, helpless, and forlorn women set on a level with their fellow creatures, and not be under the shocking and cruel necessity of starving in a land of plenty? And when the face of sorrow is enlivened with the smile of happiness and content, and the weary tradesman can lye down in peace, without fear or danger of being annoyed by the lawless plundered; when all are united in the bands of mutual benefit and preservation, and the memory of former woes is lost in the blessings of a future age; it is then we may reasonably expect, that less than half the immense sums which are now required, will be sufficient to encourage honest industry.

References:

      Moria Ferguson, First Feminists: British Women Writers 1578 - 1799 [Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1985] p 427-455

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