were ‘as intuitive’ as anti-militarism and anti-imperialism have been to feminists
in recent times.^33
Although her extraordinary life may seem far removed from the lot of the
majority of women, in other ways her life was ordinary. Like so many widowed
women in history she was left with heavy debts when her husband died.
Untrained for any vocation, she had to make her living as best she could as she
struggled financially to bring up her own family of four children and then, in
later life, her adopted daughters. Although her vision of a society in which
women were free from sexual subjection has not materialised, it is a vision that
casts its light into the present as women, ordinary and extraordinary, still
struggle for equality and emancipation.
NICHE IN HISTORY