Demarcus Powell

HIST 3324
3/31/17
What it Means to Have a Meaningful Life

Women writers between 1860 and 1925 had very little latitude to write stories about

women living meaningful autonomous life without men. In Alexandra Kollontai's Love of

Worker Bees (2003) Vasilisa is strong women who knows what she wants and how to get it, yet

she lives out most of her youth intertwined with Vladimir. In May Sinclair's Life and Death of

Harriet Frean (2004) history it was difficult for a woman to live an autonomous and meaningful

life as a single woman. Although, there are of course exceptions to the rule many women did not

have the chance to experience a meaningful life without a man by their side.

In Life and Death of Harriet Frean readers follow Harriett from a young girl to an old

woman on her deathbed. At no point in her life was Harriett ever fully independent. From being

a small child to a young adult woman she always had her parents there to take care of her. They

provided for every need she had and made sure to protect her from everything that was

dangerous. In their teachings, her parents stressed the importance of acting beautifully. Whatever

this may mean to readers, Harriett takes this lesson to heart and makes every decision in her life

by this rule. In her quest to act beautifully Harriett pushes away the only man in her life besides

her father because this man is engaged to her dearest friend. Harriet believes that by being with

him it would hurt her dear friend Pricilla far too much. So for the benefit of Pricilla, Harriett

refuses to allow herself to fall for Robin. In this act, there are three things to analyze. First, why

did Harriet believe so strongly that Pricilla needed Robin in her life to make her happy? Second,

if Harriett had married Robin would her life be different or have more meaning? Third, why was

is necessary for either Pricilla or Harriett to marry a man to have a meaningful life? To some

extent, these questions can be answered by the circumstance of the time that these women lived

in. Yet, there is never a moment where Harriett questions why she needs a man to support her or
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to live a happy and meaningful life. Harriett's reality was shaped around what it meant to be

beautiful and to her, it would not be becoming of her to marry Robin and upset her dearest

friend. This would later come to haunt Harriet as she grew older and wondered what life may

have been like if she had been with Robin. This is especially true after hearing of Pricilla's and

then Robin's sickness. Because of circumstance and a lack of self-awareness Harriet never

ventures outside of her comfort zone to explore the world and determine if she could live an

independent life.

Another aspect of Harriett Frean's life also highlights how writers of the time could not

imagine a meaningful and autonomous life for women. For all her life Harriett introduces herself

to everyone as her father's daughter. Harriett is for better or for worse defined be her father for

most of her life. This is until she realizes that so much time has passed since her father died that

almost no one knows of him anymore. This realization shakes Harriet to her core and makes her

question if she fits into the new world around her. This lack of ability to define herself outside of

her father proves that it was difficult at best for women of this time to imagine a life independent

of all men, including their fathers.

In the story of Vasilisa Malygina in Love of Worker Bees readers follow a young

communist woman through her journey during the October Revolution of 1917. Vasilisa is a

strong young woman who knows how to survive on her on. At a very young age she leaves her

parents' home so that she may participate in the Revolution. Yet shortly after leaving home, she

meets an American named Vladimir who she quickly falls for. They soon begin living together

and soon after fall in love.

They have a connection that can overcome seemingly everything. Both Vladimir and

Vasilisa are needed to help fight the revolution so they split and keep in contact with one
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another. Vasilisa runs a communal house that teaches people the values of good communism

while her dear Vladimir is a soldier for the Red army and then a worker for the communist party.

During this part of Vasilisa's life she is an independent woman and seemingly single because of

the great distance that separates her from her common law husband. Still, they long for one

another and although Vasilisa is able to forget about her new husband while she is working and

tending to the needs of others she is unable to completely forget about him. They have

intermittent meetings that are often short lived and can never fulfill their passions for one

another. They soon begin living together after Vladimir has gotten a new job as a director. From

this point on her life is almost wholly defined by how she feels about Vladimir on any given day,

and the tasks that come with being a director's wife. Vasilisa is still a strong woman who lives a

meaningful life but as time goes on and she grows into the role of a directors' wife she becomes

increasingly unhappy and her life has less and less meaning as time passes.

The developments in Vasilisa's life with Vladimir make it harder for her to work to solve

others problems. Even when she is a good wife as Vladimir asks he often pays less and less

attention to her and takes actions that bring suspicions to Vasilisa's mind. She begins to believe

that he is sleeping with another woman. Yet, at every turn, he is able to convince his wife that

there is no one else for him. The nagging feelings that Vasilisa has come to define her life for a

period. She is unable to imagine a life without Vladimir, even when her fears of him having a

mistress are confirmed and he tries to kill himself she is unable to stop loving him. Vasilisa is

defined by being the director's wife. She is unable and for a short period unwilling to live an

autonomous and meaningful life of her own. She soon overcomes those fears and after some time

brings herself to leave her husband because she has grown very unhappy, but that is where the

story ends. There is no life for her without Vladimir by her side. At the end of her story readers
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can be sure that she has left her husband for good, yet what does life look like for Vasilisa

without Vladimir by her side? Although it can be assumed that after Vasilisa leaves her husband

she lives a meaningful and autonomous life but there is no way to be sure. Both Love of Worker

Bees and Life and Death of Harriett Frean fail to show readers between 1860 and 1925 that

women can lead lives on their own that have meaning without a man beside her.

It was only during the time of 1860 to 1925 that women could even begin to imagine a

life that was not dependent on a man. In Frances Cobbe's What Shall We Do With Our Old

Maids she discusses what would be necessary for women to live a meaningful life without a man

by her side. Cobbe essentially lists the changes that need to be made in society, especially in the

education of young women, in order for women to live a life that is not wholly dependent upon a

man. It can be argued that only late in the 20th century was it wholly possible for any woman to

live a fully autonomous and meaningful life. This is illustrated in Cobbe's Celibacy v. Marriage,

at the time it was nearly impossible to imagine anything in between the two. The choice of what

to do with a life is not binary and it was almost beyond the imagination of authors to think of a

life that was not one of the two, celibacy or marriage. The life that Cobbe describes for a single

woman is autonomous but there is the question of if this life has meaning and just how

autonomous is she? Cobbe describes a single woman able to be free from the chains of marriage

and is able to travel the world. "The ‘old maid' of 1861 is an exceedingly cherry personage,

running about untrammeled by husband or children; now visiting at her relatives' country houses,

now taking her month in town, now off to a favourite pension on Lake Geneva, now scaling

Vesuvius or the Pyramids (Cobbe, 70)." Based on the reality of the times there is some doubt as

to whether many women could do these things without the support of a family or husband,

especially considering the limited options for employment for women in Victorian England. The
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limited options for employment would surely limit the amount of autonomy any woman could

have. Additionally, there is the question of how much meaning could a life of leisure have?

A life a leisure can only have so much meaning and in Olive Schreiner's The Buddhist

Priest's Wife (1891) our main female character lives a life of leisure and help people. Her male

friend questions how and why she does not just get married. In the end, the life that she lives

ends in her death. With so many different perspectives from different times periods it would be

difficult to come to a singular conclusion. Yet, it is difficult if not impossible for women writers

of the period to imagine a life for women that was both autonomous and meaningful. The women

who wrote these works were some of the first to question the organization of the world and

challenge the idea that women could live both meaningful and autonomous life.
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Works Cited

Cobbe, Frances. Celibacy v. Marriage/ What Shall We Do With Our Old Maids. PDF. Frasers
Magazine, LXV, November 1862.

Kollontaĭ, A. Love of worker bees. Chicago, IL: Academy Chicago Publishers, 2004.

Schreiner, Olive. The Buddhist Priests Wife. PDF. 1891.

Sinclair, May. Life and Death of Harriett Frean. Toronto: Random House, 2003.