Alexander Pope: Lady Mary’s Self Advancement

Throughout the 18th century Lady Mary Montagu played a significant part in the development of women’s agency. Lady Mary was the first woman to write significant literary letters of this time, Turkish Embassy Letters. In these collection of letters, she informs others of the customary, environmental and cultural aspects of various places she travels to between 1716 and 1718. As Lady Mary has a diplomatic husband, she has more agency in comparison to most women during this time period, given her ability and opportunity to travel with him. She oversteps behavioral boundaries for herself by addressing issues and aspects that are generally reserved for men, or during this time period conveyed as inappropriate for women to discuss. These issues she addresses were seen as inappropriate for any woman during this time period to promulgate, let alone publish. Her work is more than worthy of recognition and she fights literarily to assure that that is the end result. Given the clear conflicting views regarding women’s place in the literature world of this time, Montagu challenges these roles countless times whilst holding herself to a high status in her travel letter writing by using high status male figures, holding herself to higher status than other women she encounters, and her experiences of cultural dislocation.

Lady Mary Montagu chooses important men as one of her addressees, Alexander Pope, because corresponding with high profile literary male figures allows her to enter the same public space of literary achievement. This tactic offers agency to not only women in general, but specifically English aristocratic women (Lady Mary). These notions assist with societal movements towards equality and are indicative of women’s power. Alexander Popes and Montagu’s conflicting views on women’s status or place in the literary culture is evident throughout their correspondences. Lady Mary’s ability to challenge her role as a woman, specifically in her ability to distinguish between popular and exclusive spaces of communication, allows her to speak simultaneously in both worlds; using one to challenge the other, challenge her role, challenge her authority, challenging aspects of women gender roles. Lady Mary attempts to break the spatial bridge between them. Lady Mary constantly establishes a literary dominance in a sly manner when writing to Pope. She states, “As equal were our souls, so equal were our fates,” in a letter addressed to him (Montagu 73). Here, she is equating herself as of equal to legendary men. This challenges all women gender aspects at this time because women were not seen as equal to men. In a letter to Alexander Pope, Lady Mary states:

Who knows if ‘twas not kindly done? For had they seen the next year’s sun, A beaten wife and cuckold swain had jointly curs’d the marriage chain. Now they are happy in their doom For Pope has wrote upon their tomb. I confess these sentiments are not altogether so heroic as yours, but I hope you will forgive them in favour of the two last lines. You see how much I esteem the honour you have done them, though I am not very impatient to have the same and had rather continue to be your stupid living humble servant than be celebrated by all the pens in Europe (Wortley Montagu 166).

Her sarcastic tone here indicates the prevalent, radical differences between them. Montagu challenges her gender role aspect not only by entering the same literary public space as Pope, but also by making implications about his character. One implication being he cannot be trusted in representing the emotional actuality of the experiences of others well, as he lacks commiseration. Another implication, which simultaneously signifies his inability to fulfill his gender role, is the fact that he holds this power which allows him to write publically about them, yet he represents them inefficiently. In another letter to Pope, Montagu challenges these standard aspects of masculinity by referring to Bey, another nobleman of high status. She states, “I pass for a great scholar with him,” placing herself above him in a sense (Wortley Montagu 54). She uses Bey to convey her success as a scholar to Pope. The addressees as central figures and outstanding English poets, speak to Lady Mary’s ability to enter this realm that was uncommon for women of her day to do so. These letters, and Montagu’s execution of them permit her to challenge these gender ideology limitations, which further develop her as a literary figure.

In addition to Lady Montagu’s addressees that lift her into the same equality realm of men, she gives agency to women in other ways. Montagu challenges the role of women by rising above and disobeying norms of time period. She utilizes the people surrounding her in a way that invigorates herself in her travels. As she writes of her high privilege and represents herself with high status, she renounces the classic gender norm ideals. Lady Mary uses her high class English aristocrat status’s social privilege as a way to challenge various women gender roles. With this, she simultaneously gloats about them, comparing them to Englishwomen. The way in which she represents herself is contingent upon how she represents other women. Her upper class status and privileges give herself privilege to poetry in ways that flatter her, further challenging gender roles of this time period as most women did not have this privilege. She acknowledges the social world relies on public entities, within her letters. She challenges other women’s roles in order to seal her own societal upholding Turkish status. In a letter to Pope she states, “I am pretty far gone in oriental learning, and to say truth I study very hard. I wish my studies may give me occasion of entertaining your curiosity, which will be the utmost advantage hoped from it, by etc,” (Wortley Montagu 79). Montagu sets herself apart from other women by her ability to study hard and learn. She is consuming the culture of Turkish people, the intellectual assets. She learns the languages of Turkey in order to represent herself as this free women with agency, who has the ability to do so. Montagu states, “I cannot forbear admiring either the exemplary distention or extreme stupidity of all the writers that have given accounts of them,” (Wortley Montagu 71). She portrays herself as holding higher status here by emphasizing these orientalists cannot write about themselves in a representational way that is efficient. In a letter to Abbot Conti she states, ‘I had rather be a rich effendi with all his ignorance than Sir Isaac Newton with all his knowledge. I am Sir, etc,’ (Wortley Montagu 142). Lady Mary blatantly says the orient is ignorant and unknowledgeable. This conveys her rejection to the travel writers being superior to her. Although Lady Mary is an active member in society, all whom she writes about seem inactive, stagnant people who do not have the agency she has and works toward.

Lady Mary’s cultural dislocation allows her to submerge herself into other cultures and convey ways in which females are treated through her letters. She realizes that if cultures and customs are different in certain areas, there’s no reason it cannot be this way back in England or all over. Her observations throughout her travels, which convey cultural constructs, impact her ability to challenge gender roles of women. She becomes an agent of cultural change by observing all the women encounters she writes about. First, she does this with smallpox, as she changes the reality in England by bringing back a cure. This shows the cultural dislocation having a positive impact by her bringing back something she experienced. In reporting on these cultural dislocations, she writes of freedom in areas that can sometimes be interpreted as subjectivity and the confinement of women. Montagu states, “This perpetual masquerade gives them entire liberty of following their inclinations without danger of discovery,” (Wortley Montagu 71). Here, the mask is a representational object to convey the public freedom of women seen, which was uncharacteristic of the gender roles during this time, for women to be free and specifically publically free. The dress styles indicate women have more liberty, or freedom here, further challenging the gender ideology of women not being free. As Montagu continues to submerge herself into these cultural ways, she does so while simultaneously being devoted to her status and portraying her superiority. In addition to portraying herself of higher status, she wrote in a letter to Lady Mar, ‘I was invited to dine with the Grand Vizier’s lady, and it was with a great deal of pleasure I prepared myself for an entertainment which was never given before to any Christian,’ (Wortley Montagu 86). Montagu’s tone portrays her superior status as she has access to these societal happenings. She describes herself as having more importance and notability than other people she describes, specifically Turkish women here as it, “was never before given to any Christian,” yet given to her. She creates an emotional bridge with always comparing ways of others to England, something familiar to her addressee, as well as to other women whom were beneath her.

Lady Montagu’s overall desire is to continuously advance her cultural knowledge and intelligence which will assist advancing her cultural and social power as a woman in this society. Overall, she uses her social privileges as a way to convey and critique gender roles as well as place herself in a higher societal space than the people whom she visits and reports on. She is determined to obtain a place for herself as a respectable woman through the use of these letters. She constantly reminds her addressee that her writing to them cannot be done by any one else, as she is the only woman to experience these travels. I do believe she wants change, however, her use of public affairs to better her own status and life is a factor that could be held higher than her desire for change in aspects of women’s gender roles. The women she describes are not dynamic like herself, rather they are these static representations of a stagnant society, unable to break the boundaries of confinement that society has instilled. In the end, Lady Mary’s agency and liberty is only prevalent in the letters, unfortunately these changes and notions of change are never actually executed.

Works Cited

1. Wortley Montagu, Lady Mary. The Turkish Embassy Letters. Edited by Malcolm Jack. Virago Press, 1994.