ABSTRACT
The female characters in Wollstonecraft’s novels exhibit progress toward moral selfhood through their reading and writing. Although Wollstonecraft’s novels engage with philosophical conversations about selfhood and society, they focus less on philosophy and more on methodology, specifically an empiricist, observation-based methodology for women’s expression, mutual recognition, and collaborative action outside of cultural scripts. Wollstonecraft dramatizes the obstacles women face in attempting these actions. The diary entries written by the heroine of Mary, A Fiction record the process of elevating her sensibility above a debilitating sentimental version of feeling. However, in spite of this achievement, she is unable to articulate desire that falls outside of cultural norms, and thus misses the chance for mutual recognition or collective action. Maria, or The Wrongs of Woman similarly depicts the cultural scripts that impede women’s journeys toward moral autonomy. Imprisoned in an insane asylum, Maria writes four kinds of texts. Her diary entries and letters to her lover demonstrate her engagement with false sensibility and the romantic plot. In contrast, the memoir she writes for her daughter leads to an exchange of life narratives with the asylum keeper Jemima, thus demonstrating a method for women’s mutual recognition: women observe, collect, and share their own and other women’s stories with one another. Together, Jemima and Maria educate each other and readers about the stratification of society based on gender, and ultimately take collaborative action to change their own lives. By including the judge who reads and then dismisses Maria’s fourth type of writing—a critique of marriage laws written to be read in court—Wollstonecraft acknowledges that even when women learn to live authentically outside of cultural scripts they will face opposition from society.
