Woolf Vs. Herrmann [Archive] - Literature Network Forums

DizzyEmotions

01-31-2010, 05:08 PM

I'm trying to put a paper together, but I'm not really sure what to think of Herrmanns piece.

Here is a copy of it...

Elsa Herrmann, This is the New Woman (1929)

To all appearances, the distinction between women in our day and those of previous times is to
be sought only in formal terms because the modern woman refuses to lead the life of a lady and a
housewife, preferring to depart from the ordained path and go her own way. In fact, however, the
attitude of the new woman toward traditional customs is the expression of a worldview that
decisively influences the direction of her entire life. The difference between the way women
conceived of their lives today as distinguished from yesterday is most clearly visible in the
objectives of this life.
The woman of yesterday lived exclusively for and geared her actions toward the future.
Already as a half-grown child, she toiled and stocked her hope chest for her future dowry. In the
first years of marriage she did as much of the household work as possible herself to save on
expenses, thereby laying the foundation for future prosperity, or at least a worry-free old age. In
pursuit of these goals she helped her husband in his business or professional activities. She
frequently accomplished incredible things by combining her work in the household with this
professional work of her own, the success of which she could constantly observe and measure by
the progress of their mutual prosperity. She believed she had fulfilled her life's purpose when
income deriving from well-placed investments or from one or more houses allowed her and her
husband to retire from business. Beyond this, the assets saved and accumulated were valued as
the expression of her concern for the future of her children.
The woman of yesterday pursued the same goal of securing the future in all social
spheres, varied only according to her specific conditions. The woman defined exclusively by her
status as a lady determined the occasions when she would allow herself to be seen in public by
considering the possible advantages to herself and her family, a standpoint that would often
determine the selection of the places she would frequent and where she would vacation. Less
well-off women often kept a so-called "big house." They invited guests and took part in social
functions to give the impression in their milieu that all the financial and social requisites for their
husbands' career advancement were at hand. For every genuine woman of yesterday it was quite
natural to make all manner of sacrifices in a completely selfless fashion, provided they served to
advance the social ascent of the family or one of its members. .
Her primary task, however, she naturally saw to be caring for the well-being of her
children, the ultimate carriers of her thoughts on the future. Thus the purpose of her existence
was in principle fulfilled once the existence of these children had been secured, that is, when she
had settled the son in his work and gotten the daughter married. Then she collapsed completely,
like a good racehorse collapses when it has maintained its exertions up to the very last minute.
She changed quickly, succumbing to various physical ailments whose symptoms she had never
before noticed or given any mind.
The woman of yesterday was intent on the future; the woman of the day before yesterday
was focused on the past. For the latter, in other words, there was no higher goal than honoring
the achievements of the "good old days." In their name she strove to ward off everything that
could somehow have disturbed her accepted and recognized way of life.
In stark contrast, the woman of today is oriented exclusively toward the present. That
which is is decisive for her, not that which should be or should have been according to tradition.
She refuses to be regarded as a physically weak being in need of assistance—the role the
woman of yesterday continued to adopt artificially—and therefore no longer lives by means
supplied to her from elsewhere, whether income from her parents or her husband. For the sake of
Herrmann, “This is the New Woman”
2
her economic independence, the necessary precondition for the development of a self-reliant
personality, she seeks to support herself through gainful employment. It is only too obvious that,
in contrast to earlier times, this conception of life necessarily involves a fundamental change in
the orientation of women toward men which acquires its basic tone from concerns of equality
and comradeship.
The new woman has set herself the goal of proving in her work and deeds that the
representatives of the female sex are not second-class persons existing only in dependence and
obedience but are fully capable of satisfying the demands of their positions in life. The proof of
her personal value and the proof of the value of her sex are therefore the maxims ruling the life
of every single woman of our times, for the sake of herself and the sake of the whole. [ ... ] The
people of yesterday are strongly inclined to characterize the modern woman as unfeminine
because she is no longer wrapped up in kitchen work and the chores that have to be done around
the house. Such a conception is less informative about the object of the judgment than the ones
making it, who have adopted a view about the essence of the sexes based upon various
accidental, external features. The concepts female and male have their ultimate origin in the
erotic sphere and do not refer to the ways in which people might engage in activity. A woman is
not female because she wields a cooking spoon and turns everything upside down while
cleaning, but because she manifests characteristics that the man finds desirable, because she is
kind, soft, understanding, appealing in her appearance, and so on. [ ... ]
Despite the fact that every war from time immemorial has entailed the liberation of an
intellectually, spiritually, or physically fettered social group, the war and postwar period of our
recent past has brought women nothing extraordinary in the slightest but only awakened them
from their lethargy and laid upon them the responsibility for their own fate. Moreover, the
activity of women in our recent time of need represented something new neither to themselves
nor to the population as a whole, since people had long been theorizing the independence and
equality of woman in her relationship to man.
The new woman is therefore no artificially conjured phenomenon, consciously conceived
in opposition to an existing system; rather, she is organically bound up with the economic and
cultural developments of the last few decades. Her task is to clear the way for equal rights for
women in all areas of life. That does not mean that she stands for the complete equality of the
representatives of both sexes. Her goal is much more to achieve recognition for the complete
legitimacy of women as human beings, according to each the right to have her particular physical
constitution and her accomplishments respected and, where necessary, protected.