ABSTRACT
From the standpoint of the tradition of moral philosophy, it appears that the work of women philosophers which takes the form of novels, letters, or poetry can have little philosophical significance for people. This chapter focuses on interpreting five women moral philosophers, each of whom has written a work in a different form that poses particular questions and challenges to the dominant model of moral philosophy. It interprets their work and creates an argument based on the work of these five philosophers. The chapter shows that a supposedly "non-philosophical" form such as personal advice letters need not prevent the work from containing a self-contained, sustained, and systematized philosophical thesis. While the theoretical features such as impartiality, universality, systematization, and abstraction may not be problematic in themselves, making them central ideals lends itself to a certain picture of the proper way of doing moral philosophy.
