Thoughts on Thoughts on the Education of Daughters
· the text also contains” – insertion of ‘also’ maybe lessens the subject’s argument. It could be taken that she held both positions.
o Drawing on several literary traditions, such as” – Although this is a probably just a matter of taste, I’m not sure why is this backwards shifted. I would restate as “It drew on several…such as”
- Changed to "An early version of the modern self-help book, eighteenth-century British conduct books drew on several literary traditions, such as advice manuals and religious narratives." Awadewit | talk 04:09, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
· “the new middle-class ethos” – as a small point, should this be the “newly emerged” or something similar. ‘They’ did not spontaneously appear, after all.
· “…and useful skills” – ‘’other useful skills’’’ – unless those skills were trades. I realise the phrasing is used to highlight how patronising the typical thinking behind conduct books was; but imo this phrasing is clever, but unsubtle.
· “and useful skills. These themes” – is themes the right world; the detailed instructions noted already seem very specific; ignoring of course the phrase “useful skills”.
· “Her goal is to educate women” – Sadly, ‘’was to educate’’.
· “useful wives” – Too knowing and sardonic to my eyes on first reading. If the word “useful” was in common usage, as it would seem, in that context by earlier unenlightened souls, and in many other instances, and if that is what you are pointing towards, the phrase or word should be in italics.
· “text is platitudinous there are moments, such as her description of the suffering single woman, that…” – its petty, but comma after “moments”; ’’that hint at the later feminist arguments in her 1792 tract “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman Rights”.’’
· “evidenced by its inclusion in other publications” – ‘Other’ has not been qualified; where was it first published, or included. Was it published in the modern sense. Opens up many questions for the casual/uniformed reader.
· “In the late 1780s Wollstonecraft was forced to close her school in Newington Green due to financial difficulties” – begs expansion: “her school” sounds fascinating, given the times.
- I believe I do expand on this in the Mary Wollstonecraft article, but I'm not sure this is the place. There was nothing special about the school - it was a typical failed school of the period. I have made the typicality clearer. Awadewit | talk 04:09, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
· “chafed at her lowly position” – I genuinely don’t know what this means; but to be fair, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a bad sentence fragment.
· “She then embarked on a new life as a writer, a precarious…” – As you know, you’ll probably meet the punct. police on FAC, so I’ll play devils advocate here: ‘’She embarked on a new life as a writer; a precarious...”
· “Wollstonecraft quickly wrote Thoughts on the Education of Daughters, her first book, and sold it to Joseph Johnson for ten guineas” – as someone not familiar with the period, what does “sold it” mean: that she released all rights; licensed for a royalty? Also, what do you mean by ‘quickly’: soon wrote; was productive and within days/weeks; or in a rush/panic?
· As a general question, were conduct books pre-occupied with a woman’s ‘place’. I take this to be true from the “Genre” section, but given the radical bite of Wollstonecraft tract, her position should be highlighted explicitly in the lead.
- The majority of conduct books were for women, although there were some for servants, too. Scholars do not entirely agree on what counts as a conduct book, unfortunately. Wollstonecraft's book is not all that radical; new phrase in lead: "While much of Wollstonecraft's text is platitudinous and generally repeats the advice common to all conduct books for women". Awadewit | talk 04:09, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
· The spidery figures of “Pamela teaching her children” appeal to me greatly.
· Can you state when Nancy Armstrong was writing in the article body. I can see the year from the bibliography, but it would be valuable context for the bytheway reader.
· There is a shifting of tenses in places: “Conduct books integrated the styles and rhetoric’s of earlier genres”; “British conduct books are an early version of the modern self-help book”. My preference is for the present tense, as the work has not vanished into smoke.
· The above are all small and minor things, the article is very strong.
· Ceoil