Astell

MARY ASTELL (1666 - 1731)

Mary Astell, sometimes called the first English feminist, was born in the Quayside area of Newcastle and educated by her uncle in Latin, French, logic, mathematics and natural philosophy. She was writing religious poetry of high quality by 1687, and had settled alone in Chelsea, then near London. In 1694, she published A Serious Proposal to the Ladies which put forward the idea of a kind of monastery or university for unmarried women. It would act as a haven for women evading a mercenary marriage, or the fate of being a derided spinster. Mary Astell supported the Church of England and the establishment in general, and is therefore regarded as belonging to the right wing of feminist thought. A formidable opponent in written argument, she has been called 'incalculably influential' .

She believed in the equal intellectual and spiritual capacities of the two sexes, though she was willing to countenance a degree of subordination for women in marriage. In 1700, her tract Some Reflections upon Marriage, the question is posed: 'What poor woman is ever taught that she should have a higher design than to get her a husband?' Mary Astell pleads that men should look on women as reasonable creatures and not confine them 'with chain and block to the chimney corner'. Marrying either for money or for love was a matter of irregular appetites, and not reason: 'Let the soul be principally considered and regard had in the first place to a good understanding, a virtuous mind...' The preface to the 1706 edition asks: 'If all men are born free, how is it that all women are born slaves?'

She died of breast cancer and had a mastectomy some two months before her death.

Myers Literary Guide:	The North-East
MARY ASTELL (1666 - 1731) Mary Astell, sometimes called the first English feminist, was born in the Quayside area of Newcastle and educated by her uncle in Latin, French, logic, mathematics and natural philosophy. She was writing religious poetry of high quality by 1687, and had settled alone in Chelsea, then near London. In 1694, she published A Serious Proposal to the Ladies which put forward the idea of a kind of monastery or university for unmarried women. It would act as a haven for women evading a mercenary marriage, or the fate of being a derided spinster. Mary Astell supported the Church of England and the establishment in general, and is therefore regarded as belonging to the right wing of feminist thought. A formidable opponent in written argument, she has been called 'incalculably influential' . She believed in the equal intellectual and spiritual capacities of the two sexes, though she was willing to countenance a degree of subordination for women in marriage. In 1700, her tract Some Reflections upon Marriage, the question is posed: 'What poor woman is ever taught that she should have a higher design than to get her a husband?' Mary Astell pleads that men should look on women as reasonable creatures and not confine them 'with chain and block to the chimney corner'. Marrying either for money or for love was a matter of irregular appetites, and not reason: 'Let the soul be principally considered and regard had in the first place to a good understanding, a virtuous mind...' The preface to the 1706 edition asks: 'If all men are born free, how is it that all women are born slaves?' She died of breast cancer and had a mastectomy some two months before her death.
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