"The Woman's Labour: an Epistle to Mr Stephen Duck" by Mary Collier (1739)
Published in 1739, Collier's poem responds to Stephen Duck, who criticized what he saw as the laziness of women working in fields. Her 246-line poem describes the exploitation of female workers and is one of the original feminist critiques in English literature. Her work expresses the economic status of women, the patriarchal structure of society, and she writes with a distinctive feminist position.
An excerpt from "The Woman's Labour" (1739)
...No Learning ever was bestow'd on me;
My life was always spent in Drudgery:
And not alone; alas! with Grief I find,
It is the Portion of poor Woman-kind.
Oft have I thought as on my Bed I lay,
Eas'd from the tiresome Labours of the Day,
Our first Extraction from a Mass refin'd,
Could never be for Slavery design'd;
Till Time and Custom by Degrees destroy'd
That happy State our Sex at first enjoy'd.
When Men had us'd their utmost Care and Toil,
Their Recompense was but a Female Smile;
When they by Arts or Arms were render'd Great,
They laid their Trophies at a Woman's Feet;
They, in those Days, unto our Sex did bring,
Their Hearts, their All, a Free-will Offering;
And as from us their Being they derive,
They back again should all due Homage give...
...No Learning ever was bestow'd on me;
My life was always spent in Drudgery:
And not alone; alas! with Grief I find,
It is the Portion of poor Woman-kind.
Oft have I thought as on my Bed I lay,
Eas'd from the tiresome Labours of the Day,
Our first Extraction from a Mass refin'd,
Could never be for Slavery design'd;
Till Time and Custom by Degrees destroy'd
That happy State our Sex at first enjoy'd.
When Men had us'd their utmost Care and Toil,
Their Recompense was but a Female Smile;
When they by Arts or Arms were render'd Great,
They laid their Trophies at a Woman's Feet;
They, in those Days, unto our Sex did bring,
Their Hearts, their All, a Free-will Offering;
And as from us their Being they derive,
They back again should all due Homage give...