102 Hesburgh Library, Rare Books & Special Collections
Against Edmund Burke’s contention that the French Revolution was a “monstrous tragi-comic scene,” Mary Wollstonecraft hastily composed a defense in the pamphlet A Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790). Her work quickly went into a second edition, where she tinkered with her language and rhetorical strategy. Several years later, the same editorial mindset is evident in Wollstonecraft’s original and revised A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, where she brings women’s rights into the larger discussion of civil rights. The Hesburgh Libraries recently acquired multiple early editions of Wollstonecraft’s work, which bear witness to her thought process as she works out and reworks her early feminist philosophy.
This exhibit is curated by Daniel Johnson, English; Digital Humanities; and FTT Librarian. This and other exhibits within the Hesburgh Libraries are generously supported by the McBrien Special Collections Endowment.
All exhibits are free and open to the public during business hours.