The Social and Political Philosophy of Mary Wollstonecraft brings together new essays from leading scholars, which explore Wollstonecraft's range as a moral and political philosopher of note, taking both a historical perspective and applying her thinking to current academic debates.

Nearly two hundred years ago, Mary Wollstonecraft wrote what is considered to be the first major work of feminist political theory: A Vindication of the Rights of Women. Much has been written about this work, and about Wollstonecraft as the intellectual pioneer of feminism, but the actual substance and coherence of her political thought have been virtually ignored. Virginia Sapiro here provides the first full-length treatment of Wollstonecraft's political theory. Drawing on all of Wollstonecraft's works and treating them thematically rather than sequentially, Sapiro shows that Wollstonecraft's ideas about women's rights, feminism, and gender are elements of a broad and fully developed philosophy, one with significant implications for contemporary democratic and liberal theory. The issues raised speak to many current debates in theory, including those surrounding interpretation of the history of feminism, the relationship between liberalism and republicanism in the development of political philosophy, and the debate over the canon. For political scientists, most of whom know little about Wollstonecraft's thought, Sapiro's book is an excellent, nuanced introduction which will cause a reconsideration of her work and her significance both for her time and for today's concerns. For feminist scholars, Sapiro's book offers a rounded and unconventional analysis of Wollstonecraft's thought. Written with considerable charm and verve, this book will be the starting point for understanding this important writer for years to come.

A compelling portrait of Mary Wollstonecraft that shows the intimate connections between her life and work Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, first published in 1792, is a work of enduring relevance in women's rights advocacy. However, as Sylvana Tomaselli shows, a full understanding of Wollstonecraft’s thought is possible only through a more comprehensive appreciation of Wollstonecraft herself, as a philosopher and moralist who deftly tackled major social and political issues and the arguments of such figures as Edmund Burke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Adam Smith. Reading Wollstonecraft through the lens of the politics and culture of her own time, this book restores her to her rightful place as a major eighteenth-century thinker, reminding us why her work still resonates today. The book’s format echoes one that Wollstonecraft favored in Thoughts on the Education of Daughters: short essays paired with concise headings. Under titles such as “Painting,” “Music,” “Memory,” “Property and Appearance,” and “Rank and Luxury,” Tomaselli explores not only what Wollstonecraft enjoyed and valued, but also her views on society, knowledge and the mind, human nature, and the problem of evil—and how a society based on mutual respect could fight it. The resulting picture of Wollstonecraft reveals her as a particularly engaging author and an eloquent participant in enduring social and political concerns. Drawing us into Wollstonecraft’s approach to the human condition and the debates of her day, Wollstonecraft ultimately invites us to consider timeless issues with her, so that we can become better attuned to the world as she saw it then, and as we might wish to see it now.

Mary Wollstonecraft's Social and Aesthetic Philosophy examines attempts to revise representations of women to give them a more active role in public life. Combining history of ideas with close textual reading to position her in relation to other eighteenth century writers this book demonstrates how she is directly engaged in re-thinking key concepts in moral aesthetic and social philosophy, particularly where women are concerned. Bahar insists that Wollstonecraft's political claims cannot be separated from her desire to develop more convincing aesthetic representations of women.

Writing in an age when the call for the rights of man had brought revolution to America and France, Mary Wollstonecraft produced her own declaration of female independence in 1792. Passionate and forthright, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman attacked the prevailing view of docile, decorative femininity and instead laid out the principles of emancipation: an equal education for girls and boys, an end to prejudice, and the call for women to become defined by their profession, not their partner. Mary Wollstonecrafts work was received with a mixture of admiration and outrageWalpole called her a hyena in petticoatsyet it established her as the mother of modern feminism.

Blending biography, gender theory, and political analysis, Gunther-Canada charts Mary Wollstonecraft's transformation from female reader to pioneer feminist author. She shows how Wollstonecraft's pathbreaking A Vindication of the Rights of Woman and other works confronted traditional notions of femininity and authority and provided the first systematic argument for women's political rights. Wollstonecraft's writings represent a rebellion against Jean-Jacques Rousseau's portrayal of women as dangerous coquettes and Edmund Burke's vision of women as beautiful and apolitical weaklings. Her revolutionary political theory challenged the separation of public and private spheres by insisting that women could be rational players in the Enlightenment's script of liberty and individualism. Gunther-Canada gives us a Wollstonecraft who forthrightly confronted the politics of gender and genre and incited revolt against the prevailing view of women as creatures born only to "propagate and rot." Rebel Writer shows how Wollstonecraft's political ideology guided her personal life--she bore a child out of wedlock and later married amid scandal--and how her attempts to unite the personal and the political ended in 1797, with her tragic early death in childbed. For more than two hundred years Wollstonecraft's life has served as a cautionary tale of the dangers of women's participation in revolutionary politics. Now Gunther-Canada shows us how Wollstonecraft subverted the patriarchal plot of political theory and framed an alternative vision of women as citizens, making her truly a "rebel writer."

In 1790 came that "extraordinary outburst of passionate intelligence," Mary Wollstonecraft's reply to Edmund Burke's attack on the principles of the French Revolution entitled a "Vindication of the Rights of Men." In this pamphlet she held up to scorn Burke's defence of monarch and nobility, his merciless sentimentality. "It is one of the most dashing political polemics in the language," Mr. Taylor writes enthusiastically, "and has not had the attention it deserves. . . . For sheer virility and grip of her verbal instruments it is probably the finest of her works. Some of her sentences have the quality of a sword-edge, and they flash with the rapidity of a practised duellist. It was written at a white heat of indignation; yet it is altogether typical of the writer that, in the midst of the work, quite suddenly, she had one of her fits of callousness and morbid temper, and declared she would not go on. With great skill Johnson persuaded her to take it up again; and with equal suddenness her eagerness returned, and the book was finished and published before any one else could answer Burke."

Interest in the contribution made by women to the history of philosophy is burgeoning. Intense research is underway to recover their works which have been lost or overlooked. At the forefront of this revival is Mary Wollstonecraft. While she has long been studied by feminists, and later discovered by political scientists, philosophers themselves have only recently begun to recognise the value of her work for their discipline. This volume brings together new essays from leading scholars, which explore Wollstonecraft's range as a moral and political philosopher of note, both taking a historical perspective and applying her thinking to current academic debates. Subjects include Wollstonecraft's ideas on love and respect, friendship and marriage, motherhood, property in the person, and virtue and the emotions, as well as the application her thought has for current thinking on relational autonomy, and animal and children's rights. A major theme within the book places her within the republican tradition of political theory and analyses the contribution she makes to its conceptual resources.

In Mary Shelley and the Rights of the Child, Eileen Hunt Botting contends that Frankenstein is a profound work of speculative fiction designed to engage a radical moral and political question: do children have rights?

Reproduction of the original. The publishing house Megali specialises in reproducing historical works in large print to make reading easier for people with impaired vision.