Transcriber’s Note:
The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
Es gibt kein Vergangenes das man zurücksehnen dürfte; esgibt nur ein ewig Neues, das sich aus den erweiterten Elementendes Vergangenen gestaltet, und die echte Sehnsucht muss stetsproductiv sein, ein neues, besseres Erschaffen.—Goethe.
“There is no past that we need long to return to,there is only the eternally new which is formed outof enlarged elements of the past; and our genuinelonging must always be productive, for a new andbetter creation.”
The literature upon the right and the worthof woman, beginning as early as the 15th century,has in recent times increased so enormously thata complete collection would require a whole librarybuilding. In these writings are represented allclasses, from tables of statistics to comic papers.Not only both sexes but almost all stages of lifehave contributed to it. By immersing oneself inthis literature, especially in its belletristic andpolemic portions, one could find rich material forthe illumination of that sphere to which the publisherlimited my work: the indication of the newspiritual conditions, transformations, and reciprocalresults which the woman movement has effected.Historic, scientific, political, economic, juridical,sociological, and theological points of view must,therefore, be practically set aside. But even formy task, limited to the psychological sphere, time,strength, and inclination are wanting to bury myselfin this literature. I must, therefore, confinemyself to giving chiefly my own observations.
It is more than fifty years ago that I readHertha, Sweden’s first “feministic” (dealing withvithe woman question) novel, and listened tothe numerous contentions concerning it. Withever keener personal interest I have since followedthe operations of the woman movement—above all,the new psychic conditions, types, and forms ofactivities which the woman movement has evoked;I have also given consideration to the new possibilitiesand n