The Mary Wollstonecraft Statue: Why isn’t Mary on the Green?

The Mary Wollstonecraft Statue: Why isn’t Mary on the Green?

Why isn’t Mary on the Green? Where’s Mary Wollstonecraft? We’ve ended up with everywoman on the green except for Mary! Doesn’t this rather make one of their campaign slogan hashtags a never-ending question that has failed to be resolved by this statue design being unveiled– #whereswolly? Yes, one of the campaign’s hashtags really was: #whereswolly?  Well, now I’ve seen the statue, I’d call it #wheresmary because she’s certainly not on the green!

This dubious messing about with her name, splicing her name Wollstonecraft into Wolly, did seriously concern me when I first read about the campaign. It abuses her name, is condescending, disrespectful and merely serves to give us a mental association between Wollstonecraft and the well-known nickname in the English language for an idiot – a wally. Even a quick google search immediately shows that synonyms for calling someone a wally includes meaning they are inept, silly, and an array of insulting and abusive terms along the lines of being a nerd, dork, imbecile, dunce or halfwit. Worse still, especially in the UK, the visual images that unfortunately spring to mind on seeing or hearing ‘wolly’ are those of the character in the children’s humorous activity books ‘Where’s Wally?’. Why? Because Wolly audibly sounds and visually looks too similar to Wally. This is technically known as a homonym, or rather, more precisely, a homophone because wolly and wally sound the same despite being spelt slightly differently. This potential mental association between Wollstonecraft/her fight for women’s education and stupid, idiotic wallys is perturbing for Wollstonecraft’s legacy in itself.

Nevertheless, in 2018, I had just attended the inspiring unveiling of the Fawcett statue so I tried to put these concerns about the Wollstonecraft statue campaign to one side, hoped it was just an unfortunate oversight and gave the campaign the benefit of the doubt. So I was one of those who signed the petition to erect a statue in honour of Mary Wollstonecraft and gave it a mention in my Lady Mary Shepherd blog post, 28th April 2018, available to read at:

http://theladymaryshepherdphilosophysalon.blogspot.com/2018/04/a-statue-commemorating-lady-mary.html

I signed the petition to support the idea of having a statue commemorating Wollstonecraft on the basis of passages in the Wollstonecraft statue campaign description on their website about their vision and aims such as:

“The memorial will be a tangible way to share Wollstonecraft’s vision and ideas. Her presence in a physical form will be an inspiration to local young people in Islington, Haringey and Hackney. And it will send a powerful message beyond that, across the world. Just as the image of Churchill’s memorial statue is used in debates on his legacy, the same is needed for Mary Wollstonecraft.

The Wollstonecraft Society’s objectives are

To promote the recognition of Mary Wollstonecraft’s contribution to equality, diversity and human rights.

To promote equality and diversity in education, and stimulate aspiration and thoughtful reflection.”

For this quote and more, see:

https://maryonthegreen.org/project.shtml 

This, rightly or wrongly, gave me the impression that a statue commemorating Wollstonecraft would be along the same lines as other commemorative statues for men such as Churchill, other women, and feminists, such as the amazing Manchester statue of Pankhurst by the sculptress Hazel Reeves, the incredible Fawcett statue by the conceptual BritArtist Gillian Wearing and the 19^th century statue of the male feminist JS Mill, apparently unveiled by Fawcett. You would think it would be safe to assume that a statue for a feminist philosopher could not go too far wrong in design, especially if it is essentially described as suitable for young people. There is also a primary school in the vicinity located where Wollstonecraft started a boarding school for girls. 

There are even plenty of beautiful, tasteful, representational, figurative statues that commemorate animals, a wonderful example being the memorial for animals who contributed to WWII efforts (The Animals in War Memorial, 2004, Park Lane, Opposite Hyde Park, Mayfair, London). Surely a statue for a woman and feminist could not fall below the standards and level of respect given to non-human beings. Or so I thought until I saw the statue design in the newspapers showing what the Wollstonecraft statue actually looks like, hours before it's unveiling (Tuesday 10th November). I was nothing short of horrified and outraged. I simply cannot now continue to hope that degrading associations with Wollstonecraft eg #whereswolly are merely an oversight anymore. Not now the same demeaning psychological associations have also impacted on:

the aesthetic, political, ethical, feminist and social point of the statue itself;

desecrated Wollstonecraft’s legacy;

caused innumerable broader misogynistic issues for women across the intersectional spectrum.

I find it a demeaning mockery of Wollstonecraft and her achievements.

As an intersectional feminist and a feminist philosopher, I object to this statue for Wollstonecraft. I think it is an unfortunate memorial to a feminist thinker/ philosopher. It in no way even resembles her writings, thoughts, arguments or philosophy. Indeed, it clashes with her principles on vanity and obsession with women’s appearance. There are even passages in her Vindication I can remember off the top of my head which demonstrate how this nude female goes against her feminism – how could anyone with the slightest familiarity with her work think this statue design could in any way be remotely symbolic of Wollstonecraft? Worse still, as far as I can see from a quick internet search, this statue seems to be the first statue in the UK dedicated to a female philosopher. This raises the question for at least the UK – why is it that the only statue of a woman who wrote philosophy is also the only female statue to receive such demeaning depiction of who she was? Feminists in history have respectful, representational, awesome statues of themselves. One that comes to mind is Meredith Bergmann's 'Women's Rights Pioneers Monument' (Central Park 2020) which is a beautiful sculpture depicting a larger than life accurate portrayal of 3 historical women: Sojourner Truth (speaking) Elizabeth Cady Stanton (writing) and Susan B Anthony (organizing) around a table. But the only and first female philosopher of any description, feminist or otherwise, we in the UK have immortalised as a statue, has been imbued with well-known sexist tropes, stereotypes, and is designed to ensure the viewer focuses on her body not her brains. It emphasizes the very thing Wollstonecraft went to great pains to argue against – valuing women’s bodily appearance over their intellectual development.

Moreover, as far as I am currently aware, this embarrassment of a Wollstonecraft statue appears to also possibly be the only statue in the world commemorating a female philosopher, with the exception of the seminal philosopher, astronomer and mathematician, Hypatia. (It seems so extraordinary that there are no statues of women philosophers other than that of Hypatia that I am still attempting to find out if I have overlooked any statues. To put it another way, apart from Hypatia, all statues of philosophers are men, since there are no statues of non-binary or trans philosophers either.) Hypatia is considered the very first female philosopher and so is often used as the emblem of the female philosopher and feminist philosophy, for instance, the academic journal named after her ‘Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy’. Just a quick overview about the details of Hypatia’s life makes the female nude aspect of this statue for Wollstonecraft come across as anti-feminist and anti-women philosophers. 

One, Hypatia apparently had a sexless identity which she used as a reason for why she chose to never marry, date or have sex with a man, including a rather amorous male student who seemed to have no idea about women. Perhaps these days, Hypatia (assuming this story is correct and she wasn’t simply a lesbian who was struggling to come out as one) may have identified as something along the lines of gender neutral and asexual – a far cry from this statue standing around without so much as a Greek or Roman toga on. 

Two, sexless identity aside, the wrongness of a female nude symbolising a woman philosopher runs deeper. Hypatia had all her clothes removed while being violently murdered in the streets and in a church during an horrific, torturous ordeal carried out by monks on command by an Archbishop as part of a hate crime against her as well as a general wave of Christian extremism to convert all pagans (as Hypatia was) and seize complete power of the Ancient world. The fact that nudity was involved in the sickening murder of the first recorded female philosopher, quite frankly, makes the female nakedness of the statue for the philosopher Mary Wollstonecraft nothing short of shocking.

Indeed, nudity is not an appropriate mental association for Wollstonecraft’s life and death either. She died from complications following childbirth and was later written out of history due to slanderous gossip generated by her husband about her supposed sex life. If someone wished to construct a statue against female, feminist philosophers, they could not do so more potently.

I’m sure none of this even crossed Maggi Hambling’s mind, let alone enter into her artistic intentions when designing this statue. I have no objection to the sculpture per se. Hambling has every right to express herself and what she feels through the medium of art. Her statue proposal was selected above everyone else. Fair enough. However, somebody somewhere should have given much more thought to such historical context and potentially unfortunate symbolism issues before giving the green light to a publicly displayed conceptual statue in a park for Wollstonecraft, or indeed anyone else being celebrated or commemorated.

The problems arising from the unveiling of this statue for women philosophers do not stop at historical references. Philosophy is very much a male-dominated discipline. We do not need women (unintentionally or otherwise) adding to the sexism women are already subjected to in philosophy. Here was a chance to redress the balance somewhat and show some respect for  women philosophers.

How are feminist philosophers and artists meant to explain the wrongness of sexual objectification when women and feminists have erected this kind of statue, which flies in the face of what we have been trying to achieve? Why is it undoing these arguments?

As a campaigner with an on-going petition for a statue of a female philosopher, I certainly wouldn’t want a statue of or for Mary Shepherd to go so disastrously wrong. We have a good idea of what Wollstonecraft looked like whereas we don’t have a good image of how Shepherd looked as an adult on which to base a statue. However, we now have the technology to work out how her face as a child would have aged into adulthood. A few years back, I noticed a copycat campaign of mine (clearly started well after mine) which is calling for a non-representational, abstract sculptural commemoration for the first female Scottish philosopher, Mary Shepherd which would portray a woman philosopher as a thing not a woman who was intelligent and wrote philosophical treatises. I feel this Wollstonecraft statue is setting an unacceptable precedent. I have argued for and continue to campaign for a dignified, respectful, representational statue commemorating Shepherd.

As a feminist artist, I am shocked that well-known feminist arguments, campaigns and artworks have been completely ignored in the creation of this statue. Hambling's other public sculptural commemorations have not included nudity e.g. Benjamin Britten; Oscar Wilde. This statue design for Wollstonecraft makes me wonder: 

Do women have to be shown as small and naked to get a public statue for a female, feminist philosopher, while 100% of the statues commemorating male philosophers are toweringly large, complimentary, clothed representational statues of themselves looking intelligent? 

And no, creating a naked male statue for a male philosopher in the future just to prove a point will not redress the inequality balance. (The closest silver male figure that comes to mind is the Tin Man in the Wizard of Oz, but then he is not entirely human and it is clothed in its own way.) Furthermore, any positive symbolism behind why this so-called everywoman in silver escapes me. I find myself agreeing with MP Diane Abbott's tweet that this statue is "tiny, shiny and completely inappropriate" - how aptly worded for this "disrespectful", "insulting" statue, as Caroline Criado-Perez describes it!

This silver everywoman is only an everywoman to the extent that she is causing a hostile environment in society for everywoman. This statue is generating and perpetuating the very inequalities so many feminists today, especially intersectional feminists, are fighting so hard against. This silver creation is the very allegorical, mythical being we were promised on the Mary on the Green campaign website we would not get. The campaign chair, Bee Rowlatt, as an ex-showgirl, is not naive about the sexualisation of women and the implications of the symbolism in this statue, including its unclothed state or the connotations of silver. Her "feminist tendencies" meant that she hated dancing in "silver high heels" and refused to dance topless. According to this article, Bee was shocked that certain dancers in that show danced topless: 

"And to my horror, some of the dancers were topless. A proper dancer shouldn't have to expose her breasts.. It was a line I refused to cross". 

For these quotes and the full article see:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-35654337 

So if that's how she felt about it when it came to herself as a dancer, why did she think it was acceptable to allow a silver, naked statue to commemorate an 18th century woman intellectual? The article continues with this description which feels uncomfortably close to what we ended up with as a statue of Wollstonecraft:

"The dancers themselves are creatures so beautiful that they catch your breath. they're like statues come to life. There's a silver-screen nostalgia about the spectacle, and the can-can, in all its unhinged glory, sent the audience wild."

Except that we don't feel that Wollstonecraft's statue has come to life. Unlike other statues of historical people, where we do feel we've met them even though they are only a life-sized statue. This statue, however, is not of Wollstonecraft and the silver woman is too unreal to make us connect with her or her writings and thoughts. Just because some women may look similar to the nude, barbie-like statue or aspire to look like her ideal, perfect body, it does not mean she should represent all women, for instance:

all races (eg BAME, indigenous, Slav, white European, other European ethnic minorities, Roma people, mixed race)

all sexual identities (eg straight, demisexual, asexual, pansexual, polysexual, lesbian (including polysexual lesbians who are attracted to a broader spectrum of gender identities rather than only being attracted to cis women)

all body types and shapes (eg whether naturally occurring differences in body proportions, strength/muscularity, weight/BMI, appearance, etc or medically altered eg women who have had mastectomies)

all physical abilities or those with a range of different physical, mobility or learning difficulties

all ages or generations

all religions, spiritualities or belief systems - some of which are expressed through clothing

all genders (eg gender conforming cis women;  cis women who prefer to present themselves in gender non-conforming ways through their appearance, including clothes; transpeople or intersex people who identify as female; females who are assigned biologically female at birth but identify either as trans males or identify elsewhere along the non-binary spectrum of gender identity (eg agender; androgynous; polygender; pangender) – gender is also often expressed through clothing

Thus, this so-called everywoman fails to represent all women and merely gestures towards a narrow concept of who and what a woman can be and what she should look like. This is not surprising - any attempt to confine and restrict women’s (in the broadest sense) additional intersectional identities by collapsing their whole self-perception and identity into one generic umbrella term of ‘woman’ will never help bring together all the nuances of sexism, misogyny, gender experience and societal expectations and sexist gender stereotypes that feminism needs to analyse. 

The Mary on the Green campaign’s other hashtag was #vindicationformary – I’m not sure who’s been vindicated because it certainly isn’t Mary Wollstonecraft. Who is this anonymous, stereotypical, naked woman meant to be vindicating? It definitely isn’t everywoman, or indeed any woman! Besides, if an everywoman symbolizes Wollstonecraft then doesn’t this imply there was nothing special about her or her thought and writings (which included writing about her journeys abroad), she was just like any other woman. So why does she even need a statue in her honour? Why claim to be outraged that her particular contributions are not commemorated?

I have to admit, I’m not a fan of Mary Wollstonecraft’s feminism because I find it too patchy, inconsistent and not well researched – I think there are too many possible counterexamples (both hypothetical and observational in society) that could demonstrate severe weaknesses in some of her arguments. However, this is not surprising given that she wrote her most famous feminist work, the Vindication, in record timing and there were some aspects of this work that she later wished to clarify. Sadly, she died before she completed this rewrite so we shall never know what these improvements would have been. I also think her style of argumentation suits that of a thinker rather than a philosopher specifically.

Nonetheless, although I may not be the first in line to defend her feminist or philosophical arguments, I was and still am one of those at the front of the queue of people denouncing this commemorative statue for her as a blot on the landscape and a veritable disaster for not only Wollstonecraft’s legacy but for, ironically, ‘everywoman’ of all identities. 

This statue needs to be replaced.

How on earth was this statue ever under consideration? Why was this obviously anti-feminist design (irrespective of artistic intention) not deselected at stage 1? The winning statue design by Maggi Hambling was chosen over Martin Jennings’s design which would have been a skilfully crafted, representational statue of Wollstonecraft herself with books and a quill pen to encourage the reader to contemplate her writings and ideas. The quote he chose was more relevant to the campaign’s stated aims:

“Till greater equality be established in society, till ranks are confounded and women freed”.

Whereas the quote we have on this Hambling statue is not a good choice:

“I do not wish women to have power over men, but over themselves.”

Out of any context, isolated as a quote, it gives the misleading impression that feminism often aims to hold power over men (and thus perhaps dominate them) so it is just as well that Wollstonecraft has set us straight on this.

For a comparison of the two statue proposals, see the article below:

http://islingtontribune.com/article/visions-of-mary

Quoting from the above article:

“About his design, pictured above, he said: “I have proposed a statue that expresses her heroic courage and sheer force of personality. In my pro­posed monument she holds a toppling pile of books in balance by her fingertips. Carved on either side would be some of her words from the Vindication: ‘Till greater equality be established in society, till ranks are confounded and women freed.’” 

I remain baffled why Jenning's design didn't win. Just because he's a man it doesn't follow that he shouldn't be chosen if he has fulfilled the brief the best - a representational statue of Wollstonecraft which commemorates her and respects her and her achievements!