he issues of feminism brought up by Elizabeth Barrett Browning in Aurora Leigh, though they still have currency even today, had particular significance for Barrett Browning's contemporaries. For example, consider Aurora's complaints about the off-handed manner with which Romney treated her literary work:
Ay, but he
Supposed me a thing too small to deign to know;
He blew me, laimly, from the crucible,
As some intruding, interrupting fly
Not worth the pains of his analysis
Absorbed on nobler subjects. (156)
Thinking of her piece as a woman's inconsequential work, he did not even give it a chance to prove itself under close reading. He did not take her work seriously simply on the basis of her sex. Periodicals of the same time period also echoed this close minded sentiment: "Literary women (says Jenkins) remind him of beautiful flowers, that have been withered and dried between sheets of blotting paper" ("Your Literary Women," Punch, 26 [1853], 28). The writer compares the subject of women's writing to dried flowers, suggesting the inconsequentiality of their work. He claims that they only care about beauty and even that simple subject becomes dry and ugly at their hands: Many people thought that women could not do any work of the outside world with much success due to their fragility and naivet�é.
Descriptions of women's constitutions did not give them much credit for strength in ideas or actions:" The softness of the softer sex is sometimes excessive, not only in respect of heart and head, but also of general bodily constitution. The skin is so soft that it is affected by every impression; the chest, the digestive apparatus, are equally susceptible, and the feeble and sickly condition of system is termed, in genteel slang, "delicate." Delicacy in ideas, delicacy in complexion, delicacy in thought, word, and action, constitute the charm of woman; but there is nothing charming in a weak stomach, and a tendency to catarrh, and a disposition to faint on the least exertion." ("Progress of Woman." Punch, 27 [1854], 134). This view of women, harsh as it may seem, had some basis for its claims. Women's clothing did not allow anything but the most restricted movements, breathing included. Women had very little opportunity at education and so Barrett Browning felt that men had simply not allowed women to reach their full potential:
A woman's always younger than a man
At equal years, because she is disallowed
Maturing by the outdoor sun and air,
And kept in long-clothes past the age to walk.
Ah well, I know you men judge otherwise!
You think a woman ripens as a peach, —
In the cheeks, chiefly. (48)
She argued that men could not know if women could do as well as men at different things because women had simply not been given the same opportunities.
During Elizabeth Barrett Browning's lifetime several leagues came into existance to help women fight for the opportunities denied them. The following article comments on the Women's Elevation League: "We have been in the habit of thinking that women are very well as they are, but the "League" is desirous of making her a doctor, a trader, an artist, a politician, and a minister. The League thinks she does not "embrace" half enough; but we are modestly of opinion that a woman's embraces should be confined to her own family circle as closely as possible.? ("The Woman's Elevation League."Punch, 26 [1853], 52). This article suggests that women should not strive to go beyond their household, nor should men encourage such behavior in the women close to them. The writer plays with the word "embrace", using it to suggest sexual matters. The writer gives the impression that women working outside the house may become morally loose or yearn to strive beyond the family altogether. Aurora Leigh discusses the difficulty in entering the predominately male work force as a woman:
Ass or angel, 'tis the same:
A woman cannot do the thing she ought,
Which means whatever perfect thing she can,
In life, in art, in science, but she fears
To let the perfect action take her part
And rest there: she must prove what she can do
Before she does it, — prate of woman's rights,
Of woman's mission, woman's function, till
The men (sho are prating, too, on their side) cry.
"A woman's function plainly is . . to talk." (306)
She thinks that if men would allow women to try the things from which they have been restricted, that would be sufficient to prove women's worth. She knows, though, that some men would object to even the testing of the idea; especially if their concerns involved anything other than women's capabilities. One reporter argued, "We have reasons of our own for thinking that the 'elevation' of Woman would be a dangerous step, for a woman when once "put up" is not easily put down again" ("The Woman's Elevation League."Punch, 26 [1853],. 52). This warning, which seems proposed in fun, strikes at what seems like a key issue in women's rights; men fear to lose the powerful position they have so long enjoyed. With the coming of Elizabeth Barrett Browning and increasing rights for women, men had good reason to believe that their position in society would change even more than it had already.
Last modified 1993