After skimming through Volume 1 of The Norton Anthology Literature by Women, I noticed the reoccurring themes of patriarchy, women subordination, and the strength to be creative despite oppression. During the times that these literary pieces were written, women were constantly battling the patriarchy in order to get basic rights. During the earlier time periods, intelligence was seen as a sign of an evil spirit in a woman, resulting in miniscule amounts of literary works written by women. Women were not provided with equal spaces to creatively express themselves, as mentioned by Virginia Woolf. Moreover, they were not given the same publishing opportunities, many women either went anonymous or by a fake male name to have their works published. The women authors of these times used their frustration and anger as fuel in order to write powerful pieces …show more content…
She begins her letter by stating that John is working too frequently and not spending enough time with her and her family. She proceeds to denounce his work in office by stating that despite their government’s progress towards equality of all men, the women still deserve to have equal opportunities. Moreover, she also infers that a government is only as powerful as it’s people, thus, if not provided wit equal opportunities, the women will revolt against the government. Before reading this, I was unaware that women, especially women of higher class/power, were discussing equal rights and opportunities of women. I assumed that they would have primarily discussed this with the other women in their society rather than the men. Also, I found this particular piece to be difficult to read and interpret. The varying spelling and sentence structure made the letter difficult to follow, and I found myself rereading sections to verify that I understood what she was writing