A Serious Proposal to the Ladies

Download or read book A Serious Proposal to the Ladies written by Mary Astell and published by Broadview Press. This book was released on 2002-03-21 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mary Astell’s A Serious Proposal to the Ladies is one of the most important and neglected works advocating the establishment of women’s academies. Its reception was so controversial that Astell responded with a lengthy sequel, also in this volume. The cause of great notoriety, Astell’s Proposal was imitated by Defoe in his “An Academy for Women,” parodied in the Tatler, satirized on the stage, plagiarized by Bishop Berkeley, and later mocked by Gilbert and Sullivan in Princess Ida.