WEBVTT - SYMHC Classics: Olympe de Gouges 0:00:02.400 --> 0:00:07.020 Happy Saturday. This month is the 235th anniversary of Olympe 0:00:07.040 --> 0:00:10.360 de Gouges' Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of 0:00:10.440 --> 0:00:15.960 the Female Citizen, published in September of 1791. That is 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:19.360 the work she is most known for outside of France today, 0:00:19.750 --> 0:00:21.869 but she had a whole career beyond that as an 0:00:21.989 --> 0:00:25.570 activist and as a playwright. This episode originally came out 0:00:25.710 --> 0:00:32.760 on January 18th, 2021. Enjoy! Welcome to Stuff You Missed 0:00:32.800 --> 0:00:43.390 in History Class, a production of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome 0:00:43.409 --> 0:00:46.580 to the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson. And I'm Holly Frey. 0:00:46.880 --> 0:00:50.240 We have gotten a lot of requests over the years 0:00:50.340 --> 0:00:54.680 for an episode on Olympe de Gouges, who's known, at 0:00:54.720 --> 0:01:01.240 least outside of France, primarily for a 1791 pamphlet titled 0:01:01.450 --> 0:01:05.110 Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Citizen. And 0:01:05.130 --> 0:01:08.930 this was published as a direct response to the 1789 0:01:08.930 --> 0:01:12.970 Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, with 0:01:13.030 --> 0:01:16.080 the Declaration of the Rights of Man using the French 0:01:16.120 --> 0:01:21.440 word citoyen, and de Gouges' response using the more feminine 0:01:21.560 --> 0:01:28.170 form of that word, citoyen. They look very different in writing. 0:01:28.920 --> 0:01:33.400 but they're pronounced a little similarly. Olymp de Gouges' writing 0:01:33.520 --> 0:01:36.980 and political activity, though, went way, way beyond that one 0:01:37.080 --> 0:01:41.179 pamphlet that she's famous for now. And also her execution, 0:01:41.200 --> 0:01:43.809 which happened just before the start of the reign of terror, 0:01:44.030 --> 0:01:47.069 was not because of the calls for equal rights for 0:01:47.150 --> 0:01:50.350 women that she's become so associated with. It's a whole 0:01:50.390 --> 0:01:53.770 other thing. So that's who we're going to talk about today. 0:01:54.170 --> 0:01:57.730 And Olympe de Gouges, her upbringing and early life are 0:01:57.770 --> 0:02:00.830 really hazy, and they are full of contradictions, some of 0:02:00.870 --> 0:02:04.010 which are thanks to her own writing. We do know 0:02:04.090 --> 0:02:07.870 that she was born Marie Gouges on May 7, 1748, 0:02:07.870 --> 0:02:11.090 in Montauban, which is north of Toulouse in southern France. 0:02:11.840 --> 0:02:15.620 Her mother was Anne Olympe Moise, a maidservant whose father 0:02:15.660 --> 0:02:19.140 was a draper. And at least legally, Marie's father was 0:02:19.180 --> 0:02:22.810 a butcher named Pierre Gouze. But there were rumors that 0:02:22.930 --> 0:02:26.850 her father was actually Jean-Jacques Lefranc, who would later become 0:02:26.930 --> 0:02:30.730 Marquis de Pompignan. And the Lefrancs and the Moisés had 0:02:30.770 --> 0:02:34.230 been connected for generations. And although Jean-Jacques was only five 0:02:34.270 --> 0:02:39.760 years her senior, he was Anne Olympe's godfather. The Tarn River, 0:02:40.000 --> 0:02:44.030 which is prone to really dangerous and dramatic flooding... runs 0:02:44.110 --> 0:02:47.890 through the region where the Guse family lived. And when 0:02:47.930 --> 0:02:52.090 the young Marie Guse was only two, Pierre Guse died 0:02:52.240 --> 0:02:54.839 as a result of one of these floods. Aside from 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:57.620 the fact that it was connected to the flooding, we 0:02:57.740 --> 0:02:59.919 don't really know the details of the cause of death. 0:03:00.160 --> 0:03:03.820 I mean, an obvious one would be that he drowned, but, 0:03:04.460 --> 0:03:08.720 you know, flooding also causes disease and famines and other issues. 0:03:08.940 --> 0:03:12.340 So we don't really know. At some point after that, 0:03:12.560 --> 0:03:15.780 Marie's mother got married again, this time to a police officer. 0:03:16.380 --> 0:03:18.919 And beyond that, we don't know much else about Marie 0:03:18.960 --> 0:03:22.989 Guse's early life. She probably got at least some education 0:03:23.150 --> 0:03:26.669 at an Ursuline convent. She could write well enough to 0:03:26.710 --> 0:03:29.570 sign her own marriage documents, and the Ursuline convent would 0:03:29.610 --> 0:03:31.670 have been the most likely place for a girl of 0:03:31.710 --> 0:03:35.790 her station to have become literate. That marriage was to 0:03:35.850 --> 0:03:38.680 Louis Aubray, who was a caterer who had been one 0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:41.960 of the late Pierre Guse's associates. And this happened when 0:03:42.000 --> 0:03:45.970 Marie was only 17. Marie and Louis had a son, 0:03:46.270 --> 0:03:49.370 also named Pierre, about two years later. And then a 0:03:49.410 --> 0:03:52.930 few months after that, Louis died. This was also as 0:03:52.990 --> 0:03:55.990 a result of a Tarn River flood. And once again, 0:03:56.010 --> 0:04:00.020 we don't really know much clarity on the details beyond 0:04:00.060 --> 0:04:03.220 it being related to the flooding. Marie's marriage to Louis 0:04:03.240 --> 0:04:06.380 had been against her will. And after his death, she 0:04:06.460 --> 0:04:10.690 refused to marry again. And she also refused to conform 0:04:10.770 --> 0:04:14.430 to what was expected of a widowed mother. Instead, she 0:04:14.490 --> 0:04:18.990 moved to Paris in 1767. It is unclear whether she 0:04:19.029 --> 0:04:21.090 took her son with her or whether she left him 0:04:21.130 --> 0:04:24.089 in someone else's care while he was young. And she 0:04:24.150 --> 0:04:27.730 also changed her name to Olympe de Gouges, drawing from 0:04:27.790 --> 0:04:31.490 parts of Anne Olympe and Pierre Gouges' names, and also 0:04:31.610 --> 0:04:35.190 adding the D.E., which made it sound a little more aristocratic. 0:04:36.020 --> 0:04:38.920 She may have also meant her new name as sort 0:04:38.940 --> 0:04:42.460 of a racy joke, because at the time, gouge was 0:04:42.520 --> 0:04:46.540 a slang term for bawdy women. Yeah, I found totally 0:04:46.740 --> 0:04:49.990 opposite accounts of whether she took her son with her 0:04:50.130 --> 0:04:54.190 or left him with someone else. Regardless, though, in Paris, 0:04:54.410 --> 0:04:58.290 Olympe de Gouges was supported by Jacques-Bietre de Rosier, who 0:04:58.350 --> 0:05:01.429 was a wealthy man who owned a military transport company. 0:05:02.150 --> 0:05:05.230 And she spent her first years in Paris really immersed 0:05:05.310 --> 0:05:10.520 in self-study, attending and possibly even hosting literary salons, and 0:05:10.540 --> 0:05:15.540 then pouring over the work of Enlightenment thinkers, particularly Jean-Jacques Rousseau. 0:05:16.300 --> 0:05:19.300 During these years, she also would have expanded her knowledge 0:05:19.420 --> 0:05:22.900 of French as a language. Her first language was actually 0:05:22.940 --> 0:05:26.740 a regional dialect called Occitan. Because French was her second 0:05:26.779 --> 0:05:30.060 language and her formal education was pretty minimal, she did 0:05:30.160 --> 0:05:35.339 most of her writing in French through a secretary. In 1784, 0:05:35.339 --> 0:05:40.120 Jean-Jacques Lefranc, Marquis de Pompéien, died, and de Gouges started 0:05:40.180 --> 0:05:44.820 working on an epistolary novel that would be published in 1788. 0:05:44.820 --> 0:05:47.800 And that was called Madame de Valmont's Memoirs on the 0:05:47.880 --> 0:05:51.720 Ingratitude and Cruelty of the Flaucor Family Toward Her Own, 0:05:52.120 --> 0:05:56.340 which rendered such services to the Sirs Flaucor. So this 0:05:56.400 --> 0:05:58.350 book is one of the reasons why some of the 0:05:58.390 --> 0:06:03.010 biographical accounts of Olympe de Gouges' early life are really contradictory. 0:06:03.830 --> 0:06:07.710 She framed this book as a real correspondence with only 0:06:07.770 --> 0:06:12.510 the names changed to protect the reputations of the people involved. Today, though, 0:06:13.200 --> 0:06:18.719 most sources describe this book as semi-autobiographical. But sometimes they 0:06:18.860 --> 0:06:21.140 also use the letters contained in it to try to 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:24.320 kind of glean some details about de Gouges' early life. 0:06:25.279 --> 0:06:29.080 On the other hand, the first de Gouges biography, available 0:06:29.100 --> 0:06:32.720 in English, is Women's Rights in the French Revolution, a 0:06:32.779 --> 0:06:37.390 Biography of Olympe de Gouges. That's by Sophie Mosé, and 0:06:37.450 --> 0:06:41.490 it was translated from French. This biography was first published 0:06:41.529 --> 0:06:46.810 in 2007, and the author cites these memoirs, which, again, 0:06:46.870 --> 0:06:50.880 is an epistolary novel. She cites them repeatedly as fact. Like, 0:06:51.130 --> 0:06:53.670 the footnotes are literally this book. Ha ha ha ha ha. 0:06:54.460 --> 0:06:58.390 And this novel was inspired in part by Les Liaisons Dangereuses, 0:06:58.529 --> 0:07:02.290 which had been published in 1782 and was also written 0:07:02.310 --> 0:07:06.349 in the form of letters exchanged among its characters. In 0:07:06.370 --> 0:07:10.030 the memoir of Madame de Valmont, the main characters are 0:07:10.190 --> 0:07:13.570 Madame de Valmont and her half-brother, son of the Marquis 0:07:13.600 --> 0:07:17.739 de Flaucourt. In addition to their correspondence, the book also 0:07:17.800 --> 0:07:22.180 includes Madame de Valmont's correspondence with other family members. Part 0:07:22.200 --> 0:07:26.440 of this book's framework is an unnamed narrator or editor 0:07:26.520 --> 0:07:30.470 who's brought these letters together to publish and also takes 0:07:30.530 --> 0:07:33.590 a part in some of the correspondence. And this unnamed 0:07:33.830 --> 0:07:36.990 editor maintains that all the facts she's putting forth in 0:07:37.030 --> 0:07:41.350 the letters are, quote, authentic truths. And then what starts 0:07:41.490 --> 0:07:45.150 out as a comic story told through letters gradually shifts 0:07:45.250 --> 0:07:49.130 to document Madame de Valmont's attempts to prove that she 0:07:49.250 --> 0:07:53.020 is really the Marquis' daughter. and to get his recognition 0:07:53.060 --> 0:07:57.020 and support. The letters come together to paint the Flauquer 0:07:57.080 --> 0:08:00.500 family as having been cruel and indifferent to Madame de 0:08:00.550 --> 0:08:04.110 Valmont's mother, with the Marquis trying to distance himself from 0:08:04.350 --> 0:08:06.869 her while never flat-out denying that he is the father 0:08:06.910 --> 0:08:10.950 of her child. The unnamed editor and Madame de Valmont 0:08:11.030 --> 0:08:14.930 are both generally interpreted as stand-ins for de Gouges herself, 0:08:15.310 --> 0:08:18.870 with the Marquis de Flauquer representing the Marquis de Pompignan. 0:08:19.760 --> 0:08:24.190 Biographer Sophie Mousset contends that the Marquis de Pompignan was 0:08:24.500 --> 0:08:29.330 unquestionably Olympe de Gouges' biological father and that everybody in 0:08:29.370 --> 0:08:33.830 the community knew this. Even that the Lefranc family had 0:08:33.890 --> 0:08:37.770 taken pains to send Jean-Jacques away from the area to 0:08:37.850 --> 0:08:41.850 separate him from Anne Olympe when they were young. This 0:08:42.030 --> 0:08:44.770 just isn't something that it's possible to conclusively know at 0:08:44.809 --> 0:08:48.750 this point, though. For Olympe de Gouges' own part, she 0:08:48.790 --> 0:08:53.340 didn't overtly claim that the Marquis de Pompignan was her father, 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:56.040 but she did sort of seem to stoke the idea 0:08:56.080 --> 0:08:58.760 that he could be. Since he had been dead for 0:08:58.920 --> 0:09:01.660 four years by the time The Memoirs of Madame Belmont 0:09:01.679 --> 0:09:04.319 was published, we really do not have his thoughts on 0:09:04.360 --> 0:09:08.630 this matter at all, unless the letters really are his 0:09:08.770 --> 0:09:12.429 real letters, as the book contends. Which seems like a 0:09:12.610 --> 0:09:16.240 very long walk, but... I mean, it... It could be, like, 0:09:16.260 --> 0:09:20.300 we just don't really know. And this purported connection to 0:09:20.340 --> 0:09:23.720 the Marquis de Pompignan may have given Olympe de Gouges 0:09:24.000 --> 0:09:27.590 access to theatrical and literary circles that she might not 0:09:27.610 --> 0:09:31.630 have had otherwise. Apart from his status, the Marquis was 0:09:31.670 --> 0:09:35.349 a poet, playwright, and literary critic, whose biggest claim to 0:09:35.390 --> 0:09:38.130 fame at this point is having become the archenemy of 0:09:38.170 --> 0:09:42.460 the way more famous French writer Voltaire. So the idea 0:09:42.520 --> 0:09:45.760 that she was his unacknowledged daughter may have opened some 0:09:45.820 --> 0:09:49.010 doors for her. And it definitely seems to have led 0:09:49.110 --> 0:09:52.930 to some of her later advocacy on social issues related 0:09:52.990 --> 0:09:56.890 to children born out of wedlock and their mothers. Olympe 0:09:56.929 --> 0:09:59.770 de Gouges wrote one other novel during her lifetime, but 0:09:59.809 --> 0:10:01.700 she was... a lot more prolific when it came to 0:10:01.740 --> 0:10:04.400 writing plays, and we will get to more of that 0:10:04.679 --> 0:10:16.810 after a sponsor break. So We know that Olympe de 0:10:16.850 --> 0:10:20.510 Gouges had at least one wealthy benefactor who supported her 0:10:20.590 --> 0:10:24.270 life in Paris. That was Jacques-Biètre de Rosier, who we 0:10:24.309 --> 0:10:28.420 mentioned earlier. It's likely that she had other benefactors as well. 0:10:28.760 --> 0:10:31.280 She may have had romantic relationships with some of them, 0:10:31.300 --> 0:10:34.940 but like so many other details about her life, it's 0:10:34.980 --> 0:10:38.280 all pretty vague. De Gouges was also friends with Madame 0:10:38.330 --> 0:10:43.090 de Montesson, wife of Louis-Philippe I d'Orléans. That's the Duke 0:10:43.110 --> 0:10:45.480 of Orléans. And at one point, she was rumored to 0:10:45.520 --> 0:10:47.880 be having an affair with the Duke's son, who was 0:10:47.940 --> 0:10:51.660 later known as Philippe Egalité. And this may have been 0:10:51.700 --> 0:10:55.080 a rumor spread to try to tarnish de Gouges' reputation. 0:10:55.640 --> 0:10:58.420 But her son Pierre did wind up getting an appointment 0:10:58.640 --> 0:11:02.370 as an engineer, thanks to the Orléans family. As Olympe 0:11:02.410 --> 0:11:04.750 de Gouges was making connections to some of the really 0:11:04.850 --> 0:11:08.670 wealthy and powerful families of France, she was also writing 0:11:08.730 --> 0:11:12.449 plays that focused in one way or another on injustice 0:11:12.530 --> 0:11:16.250 and social issues. They tackled themes like divorce and women's 0:11:16.390 --> 0:11:19.900 rights during and after a divorce, as well as sexual 0:11:19.940 --> 0:11:24.200 double standards and the existence of debtors' prisons, the rights 0:11:24.280 --> 0:11:27.339 of children born out of wedlock, and girls being forced 0:11:27.380 --> 0:11:31.020 to marry or sent to convents against their will. Overall, 0:11:31.120 --> 0:11:34.920 her female characters in these plays had and used their agency, 0:11:35.140 --> 0:11:37.700 and they supported and protected one another rather than being 0:11:37.780 --> 0:11:41.910 rivals or adversaries. And when women in de Gouges' plays 0:11:41.950 --> 0:11:44.760 were victimized, it was not something that was played for 0:11:44.820 --> 0:11:48.020 its own sake or for shock value. It was connected 0:11:48.080 --> 0:11:51.760 back to a greater theme of social injustice. At the 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:56.280 same time, though, de Gouges' plays didn't necessarily dispel negative 0:11:56.320 --> 0:11:59.699 stereotypes of women, such as the idea that women were 0:11:59.780 --> 0:12:03.990 weak or deceitful. Instead, she framed those traits as the 0:12:04.130 --> 0:12:08.660 inevitable consequences of women's place in French society— While there 0:12:08.700 --> 0:12:13.200 were individual women who held high positions within the monarchy 0:12:13.320 --> 0:12:17.440 or the aristocracy, women as a group had very little 0:12:17.559 --> 0:12:22.890 overt political power. Educational opportunities for girls were really limited, 0:12:23.050 --> 0:12:26.390 and for most women, their only options for their adult 0:12:26.450 --> 0:12:29.230 lives were to get married or to enter a convent. 0:12:29.710 --> 0:12:32.630 And either way, they had virtually no property rights or 0:12:32.690 --> 0:12:36.570 control over their own lives and bodies. So, for example, 0:12:36.590 --> 0:12:40.470 de Gouges saw women as deceitful because they had to 0:12:40.530 --> 0:12:44.250 be to survive in this environment, and as weak because 0:12:44.290 --> 0:12:47.150 they were given no opportunities to build their own strength. 0:12:47.990 --> 0:12:51.740 Olympe de Gouges established a private amateur theater in Paris. 0:12:52.220 --> 0:12:54.500 But when it came to public theater, there was really 0:12:54.580 --> 0:12:59.210 just one option. the French National Theatre, known as the Comédie-Française, 0:12:59.429 --> 0:13:04.569 which essentially had a monopoly on professional theatre. The Comédie-Française 0:13:04.690 --> 0:13:07.930 accepted new plays and then performed them in the order 0:13:07.990 --> 0:13:10.990 that they were received. So if there was a backlog, 0:13:11.150 --> 0:13:13.959 which there usually was, there could be a really long 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:18.559 delay between a play's acceptance and its actual performance. Accepted 0:13:18.600 --> 0:13:21.830 plays were not published until they had been performed, or... 0:13:22.280 --> 0:13:25.260 until three years after they had been accepted, whichever might 0:13:25.320 --> 0:13:27.800 come first. That gives you an indication of how big 0:13:27.850 --> 0:13:32.410 the backlog was. Playwrights whose plays were accepted were given 0:13:32.570 --> 0:13:35.610 entry privileges at the theater, but when it came to 0:13:35.650 --> 0:13:38.530 the performance of the play itself, that was completely out 0:13:38.550 --> 0:13:42.270 of their control. So especially for new playwrights who were 0:13:42.370 --> 0:13:45.270 first trying to make a name for themselves, their careers 0:13:45.370 --> 0:13:49.470 really rested on the whims and political shifts of the Comédie-Française. 0:13:50.620 --> 0:13:54.420 This was true for Olympe de Gouges. In 1784, she 0:13:54.460 --> 0:13:57.990 wrote Zamora and Mirza, or The Happy Shipwreck. Sometimes that's 0:13:58.070 --> 0:14:02.610 translated as The Fortunate Shipwreck. This was a melodrama that 0:14:02.670 --> 0:14:07.340 takes place in the East Indies, involving the shipwrecked, aristocratic 0:14:07.429 --> 0:14:11.440 San Fremont family, as well as an enslaved Asian couple. 0:14:12.040 --> 0:14:14.820 The shipwreck is described as happy because it leads to 0:14:14.860 --> 0:14:19.190 the enslaved couple being freed. Degouge submitted this play to 0:14:19.210 --> 0:14:24.370 the Comédie-Française anonymously when it was accepted in 1785. As 0:14:24.450 --> 0:14:28.150 time passed after her play was accepted, Degouge started writing 0:14:28.190 --> 0:14:30.450 to the theater and its actors about when it would 0:14:30.470 --> 0:14:35.480 be performed. She became so insistent that in September of 1785, 0:14:35.480 --> 0:14:37.920 the troop leader wrote back to her and told her 0:14:37.940 --> 0:14:40.240 that they were pulling that play from the repertoire and 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:42.260 striking her name from the list of people who had 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:47.440 entry privileges at the theater. The theater also petitioned to 0:14:47.500 --> 0:14:51.700 have her arrested. That might sound a little extreme. This 0:14:51.740 --> 0:14:55.040 was not really a unique situation at all. It was 0:14:55.140 --> 0:14:59.080 common for playwrights to become really frustrated with the Comédie-Française 0:14:59.120 --> 0:15:02.140 to the point of being combative with their correspondents. It 0:15:02.780 --> 0:15:05.760 was also pretty common for the company to then reverse 0:15:05.800 --> 0:15:09.680 their acceptance of the play. But what was really unusual 0:15:09.780 --> 0:15:12.590 was for a playwright who was treated this way to 0:15:12.610 --> 0:15:18.170 be a woman. Between 1761 and 1789, the Comédie-Française accepted 0:15:18.310 --> 0:15:22.590 only nine plays written by women. To put that in context, 0:15:23.070 --> 0:15:27.210 the royal regulations required the company to produce between 25 0:15:27.210 --> 0:15:31.030 and 40 new plays a year. It was not doing that. 0:15:31.050 --> 0:15:33.730 It was really performing more like 10 or 12, which 0:15:33.790 --> 0:15:37.460 honestly still sounds like a large number of plays. It 0:15:38.880 --> 0:15:41.280 was accepting more work than it was performing, though, so... 0:15:42.160 --> 0:15:45.540 Plays by women just made up a really tiny portion 0:15:45.860 --> 0:15:49.580 of the theater's repertoire. I feel like this is the 0:15:49.620 --> 0:15:52.760 story of so many companies who set really big goals 0:15:52.800 --> 0:15:55.870 at the beginning of every year. Yeah. There's no way 0:15:55.920 --> 0:15:59.750 you're going to meet them. Aside from de Gouges, only 0:15:59.930 --> 0:16:02.890 two of those women corresponded with the company about their work. 0:16:03.270 --> 0:16:06.110 That was the Delorme sisters, who had written a one-act 0:16:06.170 --> 0:16:11.420 comedy together. The Comédie-Française performed that comedy only once, and 0:16:11.460 --> 0:16:13.780 the Delorme sisters felt that it had been dropped in 0:16:13.860 --> 0:16:17.600 favor of work by better-known playwrights. They revised the play 0:16:17.700 --> 0:16:20.860 and resubmitted it, and the company rejected that revision six 0:16:20.900 --> 0:16:25.320 months later. So while the company had taken the step 0:16:25.400 --> 0:16:30.400 of penalizing other playwrights who pushed too hard with their correspondence, 0:16:31.000 --> 0:16:33.590 Olympe de Gouges was really the only woman to face 0:16:33.790 --> 0:16:38.550 such a treatment. The Delorme sisters had not had their revision... but, like, 0:16:38.570 --> 0:16:42.050 they had also not been stripped from the roles. There 0:16:42.070 --> 0:16:45.570 was no warrant out for their arrest. Or threatened with arrest. 0:16:46.380 --> 0:16:48.840 So she wrote to the Duc de Richelieu, who was 0:16:48.900 --> 0:16:52.080 one of the first gentlemen of the king's bedchamber, noting 0:16:52.220 --> 0:16:56.480 that while the Comédie-Française had treated other playwrights this way, 0:16:56.500 --> 0:17:01.880 the theater's conduct was, quote, extraordinary toward a woman. The 0:17:01.940 --> 0:17:05.750 duke got her status with the company restored... And although 0:17:05.790 --> 0:17:10.450 the Comédie-Française still did not perform that play, her correspondence 0:17:10.550 --> 0:17:13.640 on the subject became a little more conciliatory after this. 0:17:14.340 --> 0:17:17.360 Four years passed between the time when The Happy Shipwreck 0:17:17.400 --> 0:17:21.139 was accepted and when it was finally performed. And in 0:17:21.160 --> 0:17:24.119 that time, de Gouges had revised it repeatedly. And in 0:17:24.240 --> 0:17:28.050 August of 1788, she had printed an unbound version of 0:17:28.090 --> 0:17:31.550 the play, which was technically allowed under the policies of 0:17:31.590 --> 0:17:35.070 the Comédie-Française. but it was also considered kind of a 0:17:35.190 --> 0:17:38.390 rude move on her part. Yeah, she had not quite 0:17:38.430 --> 0:17:41.109 gotten to that three-year mark yet. She kind of did 0:17:41.130 --> 0:17:45.990 an end run around the letter of the law. By 0:17:46.030 --> 0:17:49.710 the time the company did perform the play in 1789, 0:17:49.710 --> 0:17:52.879 it was shorter. The story took place in the Caribbean, 0:17:53.150 --> 0:17:56.180 and the characters of Zamora and Mirza had become African 0:17:56.220 --> 0:18:00.119 rather than Asian. The play had been retitled The Slavery 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:03.840 of Negroes or The Happy Shipwreck. It's often been described 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:08.300 as the first explicitly abolitionist play in French, and the 0:18:08.340 --> 0:18:10.740 first French play told from the point of view of 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:15.710 enslaved people. Even though the Comédie-Française did finally perform this work, 0:18:15.950 --> 0:18:20.250 the performances themselves did not go smoothly. Because of its 0:18:20.350 --> 0:18:24.370 abolitionist focus, it drew heavy criticism from wealthy people who 0:18:24.410 --> 0:18:27.980 had connections to French colonies in the Caribbean that relied 0:18:28.100 --> 0:18:33.429 on enslaved labor. Abolitionists praised the play, while landowners hired 0:18:33.490 --> 0:18:37.320 hecklers to disrupt the performances. Yeah, some of the people 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:40.060 paying people to disrupt the performances would have been just, like, 0:18:40.100 --> 0:18:42.760 people who had investments, as well as, like, people who 0:18:42.820 --> 0:18:48.050 directly owned these plantations and the enslaved workers who were there. 0:18:49.290 --> 0:18:52.830 Degouge also claimed that there was sabotage on the part 0:18:52.910 --> 0:18:55.920 of the actors involved. The ones who had been cast 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:59.020 in the roles of Africans did refuse to darken their 0:18:59.080 --> 0:19:02.560 skin for the roles. So the idea of white actors 0:19:02.740 --> 0:19:06.980 and blackface was still absolutely rooted in racism, but it 0:19:07.340 --> 0:19:10.960 didn't have quite the same connotations in the late 1700s 0:19:11.520 --> 0:19:13.899 as it would develop during and after the era of 0:19:14.090 --> 0:19:17.000 menstrual shows that started to develop in the early 1800s. 0:19:18.650 --> 0:19:21.570 France's movement for the abolition of slavery was still in 0:19:21.630 --> 0:19:25.630 its infancy when Olympe de Gouges first wrote Zemmour and Mirza. 0:19:26.270 --> 0:19:29.150 The Society of the Friends of Blacks was established in 1788, 0:19:29.150 --> 0:19:34.070 and de Gouges became a member. Slavery was abolished in 0:19:34.150 --> 0:19:39.450 France in 1794, although Napoleon restored it in 1802. By 0:19:39.520 --> 0:19:42.840 her count, Olympe de Gouges wrote more than 40 plays, 0:19:43.020 --> 0:19:45.820 although only 12 of them survive, and only four of 0:19:45.859 --> 0:19:49.310 them were actually staged during her lifetime. And aside from 0:19:49.390 --> 0:19:52.520 her novels and plays, she also wrote more than 60 0:19:52.520 --> 0:19:55.959 political pamphlets during the French Revolution, and we will get 0:19:56.030 --> 0:20:03.950 to that after another quick sponsor break. Olympe de Gouges 0:20:07.310 --> 0:20:10.990 The Carrelle des Femmes, or the Woman Question, was a 0:20:11.090 --> 0:20:14.409 literary and philosophical debate that had been going on in 0:20:14.530 --> 0:20:17.530 France and other parts of Europe for hundreds of years 0:20:17.670 --> 0:20:21.570 prior to the French Revolution, starting in the Renaissance. It 0:20:21.609 --> 0:20:25.520 involved questions about the nature of women and about women's 0:20:25.600 --> 0:20:29.139 rights and status within the society. And a lot of 0:20:29.200 --> 0:20:33.260 these same questions were argued again during the French Revolution. 0:20:33.980 --> 0:20:36.800 Although men were doing a lot of this arguing, women 0:20:36.859 --> 0:20:41.000 were also politically active during the French Revolution, particularly when 0:20:41.040 --> 0:20:44.320 it came to subjects that were considered part of women's sphere. 0:20:45.100 --> 0:20:49.090 A big one was food and access to food. In 2017, 0:20:49.090 --> 0:20:51.710 we did an episode on the Women's March on Versailles, 0:20:51.750 --> 0:20:55.230 which started on March 5th, 1789. And this was a 0:20:55.250 --> 0:20:58.130 march from Paris to Versailles with the goal of getting 0:20:58.170 --> 0:21:01.730 the monarchy to address a serious food shortage and return 0:21:01.770 --> 0:21:05.980 to Paris. Women, many of whom were anonymous, published work 0:21:06.040 --> 0:21:10.120 on subjects like education and poverty, as well as criticizing 0:21:10.180 --> 0:21:14.889 divorce and inheritance laws that favored men. The various factions 0:21:14.950 --> 0:21:18.169 that arose during the revolution varied a little bit in 0:21:18.290 --> 0:21:21.930 how welcoming they were of women. I say a little bit. 0:21:21.990 --> 0:21:24.570 It was broader than that. There were some factions that 0:21:24.590 --> 0:21:27.210 were like, nah, we only have men in our leadership 0:21:27.280 --> 0:21:30.580 and others who did allow women at least some participation. 0:21:31.430 --> 0:21:35.040 So women also formed their own political clubs during the 0:21:35.080 --> 0:21:38.640 French Revolution. Many of those clubs were still focused on 0:21:38.940 --> 0:21:42.899 the subjects that were considered appropriate for women, like food 0:21:42.960 --> 0:21:46.890 and education. Olympe de Gouges had some overlap with these 0:21:47.010 --> 0:21:50.270 other often anonymous women. She wrote on some of the 0:21:50.290 --> 0:21:55.790 same subjects, including divorce, inheritance, and education, particularly education for girls. 0:21:56.570 --> 0:21:59.270 She called for women to be able to publicly name 0:21:59.310 --> 0:22:02.149 the fathers of their children born out of wedlock and 0:22:02.170 --> 0:22:06.020 for those children to be legitimized. She also advocated an 0:22:06.130 --> 0:22:09.220 end to the dowry system and the creation of services 0:22:09.300 --> 0:22:13.460 for widows, mothers, and children living in poverty. But unlike 0:22:13.520 --> 0:22:17.320 many other women writers who were often anonymous, she also 0:22:17.400 --> 0:22:20.490 wrote under her own name, and she wrote more broadly 0:22:20.630 --> 0:22:24.389 on other political issues and on women's political and social 0:22:24.450 --> 0:22:28.800 rights in general. She advocated for professions to be open 0:22:28.840 --> 0:22:31.930 to anyone, regardless of their sex, their color, or their 0:22:31.990 --> 0:22:36.209 social status. She believed that celibacy requirements for monks and 0:22:36.310 --> 0:22:38.750 nuns set the stage for abuse and called for them 0:22:38.770 --> 0:22:43.139 to have marriage rights. She proposed a voluntary tax to 0:22:43.180 --> 0:22:46.100 try to address wealth inequality and to save the French 0:22:46.160 --> 0:22:50.340 Republic from bankruptcy. She also advocated a luxury tax that 0:22:50.359 --> 0:22:53.600 would pay for services for the poor. She called for 0:22:53.760 --> 0:22:57.609 an end to the death penalty, and she advocated the 0:22:57.640 --> 0:23:00.990 establishment of a national theater that would focus on publishing 0:23:01.010 --> 0:23:04.389 and staging the work of women playwrights. Some of the 0:23:04.430 --> 0:23:08.790 reforms that she advocated were ultimately adopted, including protections for 0:23:08.850 --> 0:23:11.560 children who were born out of wedlock and divorce rights 0:23:11.619 --> 0:23:14.620 for women. These were passed into law by the National 0:23:14.660 --> 0:23:21.100 Assembly in 1792. On August 26, 1789, the French National 0:23:21.140 --> 0:23:24.440 Constituent Assembly issued the Declaration of the Rights of Man 0:23:24.820 --> 0:23:27.919 and the Citizen, written by the Marquis de Lafayette and 0:23:27.940 --> 0:23:32.639 the Abbé Sieyès, along with Thomas Jefferson. That includes 17 0:23:32.640 --> 0:23:38.730 articles outlining the fundamental rights of male citizens. And in 1791, 0:23:38.730 --> 0:23:42.830 the National Assembly adopted a new constitution, one that gave 0:23:42.869 --> 0:23:48.130 the right to vote only to male taxpaying citizens. To 0:23:48.170 --> 0:23:52.200 a lot of people, this was a little at odds 0:23:52.300 --> 0:23:57.640 with the French Revolution's professed values, including liberty and equality. 0:23:58.850 --> 0:24:01.510 De Gouges' response to all of this was the Declaration 0:24:01.550 --> 0:24:05.590 of the Rights of Woman and the Citizen, sometimes translated 0:24:05.770 --> 0:24:07.850 as the Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the 0:24:07.990 --> 0:24:11.340 Female Citizen, thanks to her use of the word citoyenne. 0:24:12.260 --> 0:24:15.480 It followed the same basic format as the Declaration of 0:24:15.500 --> 0:24:18.919 the Rights of Man, including a preamble, 17 articles, and 0:24:18.940 --> 0:24:23.199 an epilogue. It was also dedicated to Marie Antoinette, encouraging 0:24:23.260 --> 0:24:25.800 her to take up the cause of the revolution and 0:24:25.840 --> 0:24:29.180 to use her position to advance the cause of women's rights. 0:24:29.980 --> 0:24:35.540 De Gouges published this on September 14th, 1791, to coincide 0:24:35.560 --> 0:24:39.880 with Louis XVI's ratification of the new constitution that excluded 0:24:39.960 --> 0:24:43.470 women from full citizenship rights. And the prologue to this 0:24:43.530 --> 0:24:47.540 piece began, quote,' Man, are you capable of being fair?' 0:24:48.140 --> 0:24:50.909 A woman is asking, at least you will allow her 0:24:50.990 --> 0:24:54.530 that right. Tell me, what gave you the sovereign right 0:24:54.590 --> 0:24:59.570 to oppress my sex? The 17 articles follow the Declaration 0:24:59.609 --> 0:25:02.250 of the Rights of Man point by point. And in 0:25:02.290 --> 0:25:05.150 some cases, they simply use the word woman or women 0:25:05.369 --> 0:25:09.199 in place of man or men, or they specifically include 0:25:09.260 --> 0:25:13.940 women in addition to men where they're referenced. So Article 0:25:13.940 --> 0:25:17.330 1 of the Declaration of the Rights of Women, for example, is, quote, 0:25:17.510 --> 0:25:21.050 woman is born free and remains equal to man in rights. 0:25:21.650 --> 0:25:24.990 Social distinctions may be founded only on the common good. 0:25:25.550 --> 0:25:29.669 Other articles add additional nuance. For example, Article 10 in 0:25:29.710 --> 0:25:32.530 the Declaration of the Rights of Man is, quote, no 0:25:32.650 --> 0:25:36.040 one shall be disquieted on account of his opinions, including 0:25:36.080 --> 0:25:40.000 his religious views, provided their manifestation does not disturb the 0:25:40.040 --> 0:25:43.930 public order established by law. In the rights of women, 0:25:44.369 --> 0:25:47.800 that is written as, quote, Article 11 is about free expression. 0:25:47.820 --> 0:25:50.640