Josiah Allen on the Woman QuestionHolley, Marietta
General
Josiah Allen on the Woman Question
Holley, Marietta
Feminism -- Fiction; Humorous stories; Sex role -- Fiction; Women's rights -- Fiction
"Yes," sez Samantha, "there is once in a while one that looks so from
the outside, and mebby it looks so from the inside. But," sez she,
"the hands of divorce lawyers are pretty busy nowadays. Marriage," sez
Samantha, "is a divine institution, but its beauty has been dimmed by
the rust of unjust and foolish idees and practices. Always when time
honored customs change from the old to the new, from bad to better,
there is a period of upheaval and unrest, until the new becomes natural
and common.
"Wimmen," sez Samantha, "are beginin' to look upon marriage
differently than they used to. They look now on both sides of the
question. Instead of settin' with folded hands in a shadowy bower,
waitin' and listenin' for the prancin' steed that is to bring the
Prince to her feet to ask for her lily white hand, which she gives him
with grateful, rapturous tears of joy, wimmen are now standin' up on
their feet in broad daylight, lookin' on every side of the marriage
question and lettin' the full light of day shine on it, the same light
they've got to live under after the hazy days of the honeymoon are
over."
Them forward practical idees of hern riled me, and I sez, "I guess men
have sunthin' to complain on in the marriage question."
"Yes indeed they have," sez Samantha (with a justice no doubt ketched
from me). "Lots of silly simperin' girls look upon marriage as a means
to be supported without labor, an unlimited carnival of picture shows,
circuses and candy. But in the good times comin' when men have learned
not to look exclusively for a pretty face and kittenish ways, and seek
the sterling qualities of common sense, thrift, and industry, qualities
that will keep the domestic hearth bright when the honeymoon has waned,
girls will begin to prize and practice these traits which men find
admirable.
"And another thing, Josiah, thoughtful inteligent wimmen are getting
so they don't admire the crop of wild oats that used to be considered
inevitable, and in a way dashing and admirable. Instead of blindly
accepting what the Prince danes to bestow upon her and asking nothing
in return, she demands the same things of him he asks of her, the same
purity he demands of her, and why not the same moral and legal rights,
since they are both human bein's, made as all mortals are of God and
clay?"
I gin a deep groan here, showin' plain how distasteful them forward
onwomanly idees wuz to me. But she went right on onheedin' my sithes,
or the dark frown gatherin' on my eyebrows.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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