Charlotte Perkins Gilman Quotes
Charlotte Perkins Gilman was an American sociologist, philosopher, novelist, and one of the leading feminist theorists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Women and Economics of 1898, her most important philosophical work, argued that the economic dependence of women on men is the root of their political subordination and the cause of much of the moral and intellectual distortion of modern society. The quotes below are attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman, organized by topic.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Freedom
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“The latest and highest form of Feminism has great promise for the world. It postulates womanhood free, strong, clean and conscious of its power and duty.”
Feminism" (1908), quoted in Susan Ware, Why They Marched: Untold Stories of the Women Who Fought for the Right to Vote . Harvard University Press , 2019. -
“The stony-minded orthodox were right in fearing the first movement of new knowledge and free thought. It has gone on, and will go on, irresistibly, until some day we shall have no respect for an alleged "truth" which cannot stand the full blaze of knowledge, the full force of active thought.”
The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman , (1935).
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on God
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“His Religion and Hers , (1923).”
A normal feminine influence in recasting our religious assumptions will do more than any other one thing to improve the world.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Justice
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“Feminism" (1908), quoted in Susan Ware, Why They Marched: Untold Stories of the Women Who Fought for the Right to Vote . Harvard University Press , 2019.”
The latest and highest form of Feminism has great promise for the world. It postulates womanhood free, strong, clean and conscious of its power and duty.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Knowledge
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“Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper" in The Forerunner (October 1913)”
For many years I suffered from a severe and continuous nervous breakdown tending to melancholia — and beyond. During about the third year of this trouble I went, in devout faith and some faint stir of hope, to a noted specialist in nervous diseases, the best known in the country. This wise man put me to bed and applied the rest cure, to which a still-good physique responded so promptly that he con -
“Many years later I was told that the great specialist had admitted to friends of his that he had altered his treatment of neurasthenia since reading The Yellow Wallpaper . It was not intended to drive people crazy, but to save people from being driven crazy, and it worked.”
Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper" in The Forerunner (October 1913). -
“Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper" in The Forerunner (October 1913).”
Many years later I was told that the great specialist had admitted to friends of his that he had altered his treatment of neurasthenia since reading The Yellow Wallpaper . It was not intended to drive people crazy, but to save people from being driven crazy, and it worked. -
“The color is repellent, almost revolting: a smouldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight.”
Wikiquote
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Life
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“The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman , (1935).”
The stony-minded orthodox were right in fearing the first movement of new knowledge and free thought. It has gone on, and will go on, irresistibly, until some day we shall have no respect for an alleged "truth" which cannot stand the full blaze of knowledge, the full force of active thought.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Mind
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“There is no female mind; the brain is not an organ of sex.”
Ch. 8.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Nature
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“We are the only animal species in which the female depends on the male for food.”
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“A normal feminine influence in recasting our religious assumptions will do more than any other one thing to improve the world.”
His Religion and Hers , (1923).
Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Politics
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“Until economic independence of women is achieved, no other equality can be lasting.”
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“The home is not a refuge from the economy; it is the central economic institution disguised as a refuge.”
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Attributed to Charlotte Perkins Gilman:
“What we call women's nature is for the most part women's training under economic dependency.”