In A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf emphasized the importance of Aphra Behn in the evolution of a women's literary tradition. Prior to Behn's career, women's works that survive were written primarily by members of the upper class. For the most part, it was these women who had the time and the education necessary to engage in any sort of literary creation. Behn's position is extraordinary because of the volume of her work that survives and the circumstances that surrounded her life and career.
As Woolf suggested, Behn was a middle class woman who earned her living with her pen. Biographical details of Behn's life are shrouded in uncertainty, but all sources agree that she was married for only a short period of time, definitely less than 2 years. Mr. Behn was most likely a Dutch merchant, who died a short time after his marriage to Aphra, sometime in 1665 or 1666. After her husband's death, Behn had a short-lived career as a spy for the crown in Antwerp and was later imprisoned in England for debts incurred completing that assignment.
In 1670, she began a career as playwright in the London theater world--an
unprecedented move for a woman. Some suggest that the door was cracked
for her entrée by theater companies, who had just begun to use women
for women's roles. By 1675, she had attracted enough attention to
be named as a
dramatic writer in a compilation of poets by her contemporary Edward
Phillips, who noted her position was "so much the more considerable as
being a Woman."
Behn's first two plays did well but her third was a failure. After
the failure of her third play, Behn attacked her critics for judging the
play harshly only because of her gender. She also spoke out against
contemporary expectations for women writers and insisted on her right to
write and be judged by the same standards as her male counterparts.
Despite her justifications for women as writers, Behn referred to her inner
poet as masculine. Woolf recognized Behn's place as a woman
in an essentially male world and cited her accomplishment:
Woolf's designation of Behn as a key figure in the evolution of
writing as a career for women was diminished by her attack on Behn's morality.
Woolf is not alone in her devaluation of Behn's literary contributions.
The charge of immorality has always been attached to Behn's writings.
According to Link, Behn "had to defend her plays against charges of indecency,
not because of their comparative lewdness to others in that period, but
because women were not supposed to write bawdy on equal terms with men."
According to Woolf, the immorality of Behn diminished the impact of her
accomplishment. Although she had opened the door for other women
to pursue careers as writers, the nature of her writings caused the door
to be only cracked, rather than flung open wide:
Throughout her career, Behn was a writer of her times. She
wrote with all the lewdness of her male counterparts and followed the current
fashions. Additionally, in her early plays, she used the power of
her pen to express her Tory politics openly. Behn was loyal to the
Stuart kings throughout her life and her writings reflect those convictions.
Her overt criticism of the Whigs was put to an abrupt end in 1662 when
she drew King Charles' personal wrath by daring to criticize his bastard
son, Monmouth, in one of her plays. After a brief imprisonment and
4-year hiatus in writing, Behn returned to writing but without the blatant
and biting criticism that characterized her earlier writings.
Behn wrote most of her prose works in the waning years of her life, with many of them remaining unpublished until after her death. Through these works, readers can obtain significant insights on the status and roles of women during Behn's lifetime. Given that Behn's writing decisively echoed the sentiments of her time, it is likely that her depictions of women were also true to Behn's view of the world. One may also assume that her characterizations are as deliberate in their form and presentation in her prose as they are in her plays.
Woolf recognized and acknowledged the contributions of Behn as an early
woman writer. Using the power of her own pen, Behn became a revolutionary
influence on the social life and literature of her age. As one of
the first women to earn a living as a writer, she struggled to overcome
male prejudice and jealousy and became a pioneer in equal rights.
Duffy M: The Passionate Shepherdess. London: Jonathan Cape, 1977.
Link FM: Aphra Behn. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1968.
Woodcock G: The Incomparable Aphra. London: TV Boardman and Company
Limited, 1948.