Donna Lynn Tillotson
Donna Lynn Tillotson is a thesis-based MA student and teaching assistant in the Department of English Language and Literature at Queen's University. She holds a BA Honours in History and Law from Carleton University. Her research explores the intersections of gender, race, and class within literature, challenging traditional narratives and amplifying marginalized voices.
ABSTRACT
In 1831, two of the most popular books published in Great Britain were a revision of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and the first female slave narrative, The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave. This essay contends that while both works contributed to contemporary social movements, the activism surrounding Shelley's novel differed significantly from that surrounding Prince's. Viewing these cases through an intersectional lens reveals that despite the popularity of Prince's book within the abolitionist movement and its advocacy for social justice, it operated outside the formal legal mechanisms and the scope of mainstream abolitionist activism. As there was no dedicated activism addressing the specific plight of Black enslaved women, this essay argues that the activism of the time predominantly represented Shelley's experiences rather than Prince's.
In 1831, women were still struggling to be recognized by publishers and make their way into the literary world. Nonetheless, two of the most popular books printed in Great Britain that year were a revision of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus and the first female slave narrative, The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave. This book was ghostwritten by the eponymous Black woman, who emigrated from the West Indies, and recollects the horrors of her experience. Their success coincided with and aided contemporary social movements, specifically the feminist and abolitionist movements that were simultaneously growing and demanding attention. By comparing the two cases through the lens of intersectionality and considering the opportunity structures of the feminist and abolitionist movements of 1831, this essay argues that activism of the time acted for Shelley but not Prince.
To better understand the oppression confronted by Shelley and Prince, it is necessary to understand the concept of intersectionality. An oppression structure first described by Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989, intersectionality concerns social identities that increase privilege or disadvantages and provide access to various social opportunities, systems of inequality, and relationships among different identities (p.140). Sociologist Mary Romero states that intersectionality implies that privileges are not personal but are institutional arrangements (Romero, 2018, p. 38). Analyzing each factor—gender, race, and class—individually offers a limited, one-dimensional view of oppression. That is, “race alone cannot explain their differences. Gender alone cannot describe their circumstances, nor can class” (Romero, 208, p. 13). To properly execute social justice and overcome the intersectional disadvantages of a kyriarchy—a social structure based on domination and coercion—a person’s whole identity must be considered; social hierarchies are not one-dimensional (Romero, 2018, p. 39). Crenshaw explains that activism around only certain known opportunity structures—the frameworks of socially-structured means and rules available for a social group to achieve its aims and interests, which are culturally defined and oriented toward social success—marginalizes “those who are multiply-burdened and obscures claims that cannot be understood as resulting from discrete sources of discrimination” (p. 140). Thus, if we consider that “intersectional analysis requires uncovering power, privilege and opportunity structures and examining their link to social identities,” it is apparent that Shelley as an upper-class white woman published within the feminist movement, while Prince as an enslaved black woman published for someone else’s cause, which theoretically erased her by not representing her (Romero, 2018, p. 11).
By the turn of the nineteenth century, virtually everyone in Great Britain read books, magazines, and newspapers regularly (St. Clair, 2004, p.13). According to William St. Clair, by the 1820s, it was clear that the surge in reading was not a temporary blip: “The [R]omantic period marked the start of a continuing, self-sustaining, expansion, a take-off in the nation’s reading equivalent to that take-off in manufacturing” (p. 13). This development was important for social activism: literature had a prominent role in British society and powerful higher-income groups believed that “when literature elevated the feelings of readers, many believed, it could help to sustain religious and moral values” (St. Clair, 2004, p. 13). This gave books like Frankenstein and The History of Mary Prince credence for social activism and led to their popularity.
Gender negotiation was a significant part of Frankenstein’s journey. Originally published anonymously in 1818 and reprinted in 1823, the 1831 revised republication of Frankenstein marked the first time Shelley made an “explicit” and public claim to authorship (Shelley, Frankenstein, 108, p. 363). Although Shelley had written other novels, Frankenstein remained her most popular, largely due to stage adaptions that were beyond the scope of copyright, meaning she received no reward for their production (St. Clair, 2004, p. 367). Shelley was a novelist and literary celebrity, the daughter of egalitarian feminist icon Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin. By the age of 24, she was a mother and the widow of poet Percy Shelley, living in near-poverty as others profited from her intellectual property. Although “in 1830, Athenaeum had listed her as the most distinguished literary woman of her time” (Gordon, 2015, p. 503), the negotiations necessary for a woman to write her way into the public sphere are shown in situations like the fact that Percy, rather than Mary, edited the original proofs in 1817 (Shelley, 2016, p. 362). From the beginning, Shelley was concerned with her “print-worth dignity” (Shelley, 2016, p. 363) and was careful to represent herself as a respectable version of the woman author in a male dominated industry.
The 1831 version of Frankenstein marked a departure from the original. Shelley revised the text to make it softer, removing such things as Victor Frankenstein’s free will to create a monster and a reference to incest. Her text indicates a desire to change certain aspects of her culture’s social and political structures rather than the structures themselves (Shelley, 2016, p. 4). Although aspects of Shelley’s life prove feminist—publishing a Gothic horror novel at a time when women were regarded for their domesticity; Frankenstein’s unconventional commentary on science and regeneration; her relationship with Percy outside of wedlock—there is an inherent submission to social order in her life and writing. In the introduction to the 1831 revision of Frankenstein, Shelley writes timidly about her role in its creation (p. 12) and about prioritizing “cares of the family” (p. 21), aligning with the conservative ideology of the time. Within the text, Frankenstein’s bride, Elizabeth Lavenza—who was no paragon of strength in the original edition—is even more powerless, silent, and weak, reflecting Shelley’s pessimism about women’s chances for happiness when they are dependent on men (Gordon, 2015, p. 504). Frankenstein says of Lavenza that he “looked upon Elizabeth as mine—mine to protect, love, and cherish. All praises bestowed on her, I received as made to a possession of my own” (Shelley, 2016, p. 43). Still, Shelley was personally determined to “defend & support victims to the social system” (Shelley, 1987, p. 557) and driven by a need to expose class hatred, racism, and unabated prejudice (Gordon, 2015, p. 504) by creating a monster in a foreign land with no means of surviving, facing social rejection.
Discussing Shelley’s 1831 Frankenstein in “This Thing of Darkness’: Racial Discourse in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein,” Allan Smith explains that “references of race and slavery echo throughout the novel” (Smith, 2004, p. 209). Smith references the monster’s quest to learn and read language in secret much like a slave of the time would have, the parallels of the monster’s told story to popular slave narratives, and the fear of insurrection similar to the slave uprising in Haiti in 1790. Smith explains that Shelley’s account of the monster’s potential to rise up, and Frankenstein’s fear of it, “might be seen [as Shelley] presenting both sides of the issue; sympathetic to the [m]onster, but also registering shock and horror at his however justifiable excesses” (p. 218). Shelley’s references to race within Frankenstein demonstrate her adoption of the discourse around the British abolitionist movement.
Most of what is known about Mary Prince is from The History of Mary Prince. This controversial text was a transcription of Prince’s experience as a slave in the West Indies and her journey to England. The harrowing, ghostwritten narrative was transcribed by Susanna Strickland and published by Thomas Pringle, members of the Anti-Slavery Society and the British abolitionist movement. The text was widely popular and received three printings. It was also broadly contested, going to trial for libel, where Prince took the stand (Hanley, 2018, p. 95) shortly before she died. The abolitionist movement had championed other slave narratives, particularly by Black male slaves who wanted to document their experiences and refute claims that they lacked reason and, therefore, could not write, making them somehow less than human (Gates Jr, 1987, p. xiv). For example, Olaudah Equiano, Black abolitionist and writer of his own 1789 slave narrative, discusses his freedom in England and consequently preserving his newfound status as subject rather than object (Gates Jr., 1987, p. xxii). Although Prince’s narrative, more than 40 years later, “broke the silence” (Gates Jr., 1987, p. xxvi) of the Black woman slave in the only known documentation of her life, she also presents herself as an authority, writing, “Few people in England know what slavery is” and “I have been a slave—I have felt what a slave feels” (Prince, 2002, p. 11).
Grouping all slaves together rather than expressing a call for action for Black women suggests a negotiation of gender. Scholar Helena Woodward notes:
Both Shelley and Prince grappled with the credible presentation of their stories, though for Shelley, it meant an artistic conformity commensurate with the nineteenth-century English [R]omantic literary tradition. For Prince, whose narrative was ghostwritten, “self” presentation more than literary meritocracy was essential in order to influence an English readership coming to terms with an antislavery momentum in Britain. (p. 17)
Prince, in her journey to becoming a subject, shares examples of the brutality she faced, explicitly demonstrating oppression arising from her historical circumstance. She states, “[her mistress] caused me to know the exact difference between the smart of the rope, the cart-whip, and the cow-skin, when applied to my naked body by her own cruel hand” (Prince, 2002, p. 6). She is especially vivid regarding certain details: “Prince’s account makes her readers acutely aware that the sexual brutalization of the [B]lack woman slave—along with the enforced severance of a mother’s natural relation to her children and the lover of her choice—defined more than any other aspect of slavery the daily price of bondage” (Gates Jr., 1987, p. xxv). Prince’s narrative shows she faced oppression specific to the intersection of slavery, its repercussions of economic exploitation, and gender.
To understand the activism around Shelley and Prince, it is important to analyze the British Romantic Era feminist and abolitionist movements and the opportunity structures they challenged. In the years leading up to The Slavery Abolition Act 1833, which ended slavery in the West Indies and proposed a six-year plan to free those currently in bondage, the abolitionist movement was motivated to prove the inhumanity of slavery. Activism by women during the Romantic period, however, was superficial, as little changed legally and coverture persisted: women had “no political rights, were limited to a few lowly vocations… and were legally nonpersons who lost their property to their husbands at marriage and were incapable of instituting an action in the courts of law” (Wollstonecraft, 2012, p. 209). Feminist and abolitionist activism were present throughout the era.
Feminist movements before 1831 comprised two streams: egalitarian and maternal. Women were guided by the social doctrine of “separate spheres,” which placed them in the domestic sphere and afforded them virtually no legal rights or personhood. Mary Wollstonecraft wrote A Vindication of the Rights of Woman in 1792, setting the egalitarian feminist movement in Great Britain in motion. Wollstonecraft petitioned for equality, often comparing women’s roles in British society to slaves. Of women, Wollstonecraft said, “[t]hey may be convenient slaves, but slavery will have its constant effect” (p. 41). This offered a philosophical approach to gender inequality, rather than an alignment of the feminist movement with abolitionism. Maternal feminism was practiced by many middle-class White women, who believed women played an important but distinct role in society and politics as mothers and caregivers. This played into the doctrine of separate spheres by emphasizing “women’s unique qualities and roles, the domestic basis of both their private and their public duties, and their spiritual rather than social equality” (Midgley, 1993, p. 346). All feminist groups promoted the importance of education for all women, especially working-class British girls; some believed education made women fit for their “proper” roles as good wives and mothers, reliable domestic servants, and teachers of the poor (Midgley, 1993, p. 351). Moreover, “the woman question”— specifically, women’s suffrage, and more broadly, the changing political, economic, and professional roles for women alongside social and sexual liberation—had not gained the urgency it would in the second half of the nineteenth century (Midgley 1993, p. 347).
It is important to note that, although Shelley encapsulated many feminist ideals of her time, she never publicly advocated for women’s rights (Shelley, 2012, p. 12). Shelley’s best-known act of activism, outside of publishing, was her refusal to purchase slave-grown sugar (549). This widespread boycott was initiated by middle-class White women but also notably adopted by working-class women, tens of thousands of whom joined the boycott and signed petitions to Parliament, although full participation in organizations was generally not encouraged for working-class women (Midgley, 1993, p. 356). Although Shelley did not publicly advocate for women’s rights, feminism in 1831 was mainly supported by and for White, middle-class women like Shelley.
In the ambit of the law, the abolitionist movement was not structured for the freedom of women by women, nor did it emphasize the limited opportunity structure afforded to female slaves such as Prince. Still, women’s anti-slavery societies articulated their concern and identification with enslaved Black women as part of a “sisterhood” (Midgley, 1993, p. 353). Most women in the anti-slavery movement through the late 1830s were maternal feminists, who placed an emphasis on respectability and justified their activism as an acceptable extension of domestic and religious duties (Midgley, 1993, p. 346). British women’s vision of freedom in a post-emancipation society was rooted in the dominant middle-class ideology, centrally concerned with promoting “proper” relations among genders, classes, and races. Female anti-slavery campaigners looked to mould freed slave women into their own idealized, middle-class image (Midgley, 1993, p. 352). They envisioned a society in which women were exempt from field labor on plantations (Midgley, 1993, p. 351). Therefore, many leading female British anti-slavery activists recoiled from the intrusion of the woman question into the abolitionist movement (Midgley, 1993, p. 349). Consequently, much of the activism around legal rights of slaves was done by male-dominated anti-slavery societies who weren’t interested in the specific rights of female slaves (Midgley, 1993, p. 349). Furthermore, “in putting their own words into the mouths of enslaved [B]lack women,” White women activists exhibited their emotional identification with them while also “effectually silencing enslaved women’s own words” (Midgley, 1993, p. 354). In contrast, Prince’s tale was “an impassioned and articulate call of a woman who had broken her own bonds” (Midgley, 1993, p. 355), falling outside the scope of the activism of female anti-slavery societies. The abolitionist movement did not look to offer opportunity to enslaved Black women, but instead looked to cast them into different modes of oppression.
This essay demonstrates that, at the time of the revised republication of Frankenstein and publication of The History of Mary Prince, social justice movements existed that could have benefited the different opportunity structures their authors lived in. However, only Shelley would have received sufficient activist support. Despite the popularity of Prince’s book within the abolitionist movement, and its form as a demand for social justice, it did so outside the formal mechanisms of law and purview of abolitionist activism. Because there was no specific activism for Black enslaved women, there was no social justice for Prince. Therefore, although Prince wrote for the abolitionist movement, neither the feminist nor abolitionist movement supported her.
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