"all women together should let flowers fall on the tomb of Aphra Behn...for it was she who earned them the rights to speak their minds." Virginia Woolf
Women throughout history have often wondered "what hope do I have of ever being remembered?" That sense of disappearance extends across the great, the successful, from those who obeyed society's dicatates, to those who ignored them, to those who were ordinary. Not only do individual women disappear but the models for whole groups of women, the archetypes of history...the real women as opposed to the martyrs, madonnas, and witches of fantasy, are all made to disappear. In order to have just a taste of the experience of having real models we can look at the life of Aphra Behn. Sadly, few women know of her existence at all.
Aphra (or Eaffray) Behn was born July 10, 1640 near Canterbury, England. She died in 1689 and was buried in Westminster Abbey. Below the inscription on her tombstone read the words: "Here lies a Proof that Wit can never be/Defence enough against Mortality." She was quoted as saying that she had led a "life dedicated to pleasure and poverty."
Behn was very political in her early writings. She was sympathetic to Catholics during anti-Catholic fevor of the 1680's. She was firmly dedicated to King Charles II. She was a Tory supporter who believed in absolute allegence to the King, who governed by divine right. She was distrustful of Parliament and Whigs since the Revolution and wrote propaganda in support of the restored monarchy.
By 1666 Behn had become attached to the Court, and was recruited as a political spy by Charles II. Her code name for her exploits is said to have been Astrea, a name under which she subsequently published much of her writings. During the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1665 she went to the Netherlands as a spy. When she returned to London, King Charles didn't pay her for her services or expenses and she ended up in debters prison. In 1669 an undisclosed source paid Behn's debts and she was released. Starting from this point she became one of the first women who wrote for a living.
She was an adventuress who traveled to the West Indies and became involved in a slave rebellion. She was an early abolitionist who's novel "Oroonoko" contained the first widely read account of the horrors of slavery.
She wrote 17 plays which were all performed within 17 years and she also found time to write 13 novels and a collection of poems and political pamphlets. Her most popular works included The Rover, Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister, and Oroonoko. Writer Virginia Woolf thought that Behn's total career was more important than any particular work it produced. Woolf wrote, "All women together, ought to let flowers fall upon the grave of Aphra Behn...for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds."
Her writings reflected her relationships with women and included many references to this which made her popular in the writing and artistic communities of the 20th century and present day. In an age of libertines, Behn undertook to proclaim and to analyze women's sexual desire, as manifested in her characters and in herself.
After a hiatus in the 19th century, when both the writer and her work were dismissed as indecent, Behn's fame has now undergone an extraordinary revival. She has become a favorite among sexually liberated women, particularly bisexuals and lesbians, who proclaim her as one of their most positive influences.
Why has Aphra Behn, and all that she could have taught us about women of the past, all but disappeared? I feel a sense of outrage that such an important element of herstory is not actively taught to all girls. How many years do we spend listening to supposedly "great" deeds of warriors and armies? How hidden are the real heroines?
Women throughout history have often wondered "what hope do I have of ever being remembered?" That sense of disappearance extends across the great, the successful, from those who obeyed society's dicatates, to those who ignored them, to those who were ordinary. Not only do individual women disappear but the models for whole groups of women, the archetypes of history...the real women as opposed to the martyrs, madonnas, and witches of fantasy, are all made to disappear. In order to have just a taste of the experience of having real models we can look at the life of Aphra Behn. Sadly, few women know of her existence at all.
Aphra (or Eaffray) Behn was born July 10, 1640 near Canterbury, England. She died in 1689 and was buried in Westminster Abbey. Below the inscription on her tombstone read the words: "Here lies a Proof that Wit can never be/Defence enough against Mortality." She was quoted as saying that she had led a "life dedicated to pleasure and poverty."
Behn was very political in her early writings. She was sympathetic to Catholics during anti-Catholic fevor of the 1680's. She was firmly dedicated to King Charles II. She was a Tory supporter who believed in absolute allegence to the King, who governed by divine right. She was distrustful of Parliament and Whigs since the Revolution and wrote propaganda in support of the restored monarchy.
By 1666 Behn had become attached to the Court, and was recruited as a political spy by Charles II. Her code name for her exploits is said to have been Astrea, a name under which she subsequently published much of her writings. During the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1665 she went to the Netherlands as a spy. When she returned to London, King Charles didn't pay her for her services or expenses and she ended up in debters prison. In 1669 an undisclosed source paid Behn's debts and she was released. Starting from this point she became one of the first women who wrote for a living.
She was an adventuress who traveled to the West Indies and became involved in a slave rebellion. She was an early abolitionist who's novel "Oroonoko" contained the first widely read account of the horrors of slavery.
She wrote 17 plays which were all performed within 17 years and she also found time to write 13 novels and a collection of poems and political pamphlets. Her most popular works included The Rover, Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister, and Oroonoko. Writer Virginia Woolf thought that Behn's total career was more important than any particular work it produced. Woolf wrote, "All women together, ought to let flowers fall upon the grave of Aphra Behn...for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds."
Her writings reflected her relationships with women and included many references to this which made her popular in the writing and artistic communities of the 20th century and present day. In an age of libertines, Behn undertook to proclaim and to analyze women's sexual desire, as manifested in her characters and in herself.
After a hiatus in the 19th century, when both the writer and her work were dismissed as indecent, Behn's fame has now undergone an extraordinary revival. She has become a favorite among sexually liberated women, particularly bisexuals and lesbians, who proclaim her as one of their most positive influences.
Why has Aphra Behn, and all that she could have taught us about women of the past, all but disappeared? I feel a sense of outrage that such an important element of herstory is not actively taught to all girls. How many years do we spend listening to supposedly "great" deeds of warriors and armies? How hidden are the real heroines?
