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Audiobook edition · 5 h 5 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if your husband could use the law to take your child and lock you away?
Maria Venables wakes in a private madhouse, confined against her will by her husband, George. He wants her fortune and her child. Maria wants freedom and her daughter back. In Mary Wollstonecraft’s unfinished novel, the Gothic terror of confinement meets the ordinary power of marriage law.
Inside the asylum, Maria finds unexpected company. Jemima, the attendant hardened by poverty and cruelty, begins to share her cause. Henry Darnford, a fellow prisoner, lends her books and offers friendship and the hope of love. Their stories expose a world where women’s lives are shaped by rank, money, and institutions.
What you’ll discover
- A marriage turned prison Follow Maria’s struggle against a husband who turns law and confinement into weapons.
- An unlikely ally Meet Jemima, whose harsh experience of poverty brings another woman’s wrongs into view.
- Books and human connection Discover how Henry Darnford’s friendship offers Maria companionship within the lonely house.
- A mother writes Read the memoirs Maria addresses to her daughter, hoping her mistakes can become warnings.
- Ideas given human stakes Explore Wollstonecraft’s challenge to institutions through women’s stories, rather than argument alone.
Who will love it
Readers who enjoy fierce heroines, gothic settings and bold ideas will love this novel of feeling, friendship and courage. It also appeals to those drawn to the early struggle for women's rights.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A husband's word becomes a prison
- Listening opens a way toward trust
- Sympathy can become an imagined hero
- Jemima reveals another kind of captivity
- Marriage mistakes escape for freedom
- Leaving does not end his power
- Private wrongs become a public case
- Different voices expose the same wrong
- Women's wrongs reach across social classes
Who’s who
- Maria VenablesA sensitive, clever wife, locked in a madhouse by her husband, who wants her freedom and her missing daughter.
- JemimaMaria's jailer, a hardened woman who survived abuse and poverty and who slowly comes to trust the prisoner she guards.
- Henry DarnfordA passionate fellow prisoner, confined by a plot over his inheritance, who reads, writes to Maria and falls in love with her.
- George VenablesMaria's husband, a merchant and gambler who wants her uncle's fortune and treats his wife as his property.
- Maria's uncleA kind, wounded man who taught Maria independence and who leaves his fortune to her and her daughter.
- PeggyA sailor's wife whom young Maria helps, a poor woman fighting to keep her children and her cottage.
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Maria; Or, The Wrongs of Woman
by Mary Wollstonecraft · 1798
Maria wakes in a madhouse, parted from her baby, and finds her only ally in her jailer Jemima.
Challenging2–5 hours to read2 languages
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In short
What would you do if your husband had you locked in a madhouse to seize your money, and took your baby of four months from your arms? Maria, or The Wrongs of Woman is a novel by Mary Wollstonecraft, left unfinished when she died in 1797.
Maria; Or, The Wrongs of Woman at a glance
- Reading time
- About 3 h2 h 25 min fast, 3 h 35 min slow
- Length
- 43,100 words
- Library level
- Challenging long sentences, a rich vocabulary
- First published
- 1798by Mary Wollstonecraft
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A wife is locked away as mad
Maria sits in a corner of what she calls the house of despair. Her mind is overwhelmed by rage, grief and fear for her missing child. One thought rises above all others: her baby has been torn from her while she was nursing it.
Wollstonecraft opens with a quiet joke at the gothic novel. Other writers fill their castles with ghosts and monsters, she says, but those are made of dreams. The groans in this building are real. The horror here is made by people, not by spirits.
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Which edition is right for me
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas of the whole book in about 14 minutes. A good first look, or a refresher.
Details
- First published
- 1798
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 3 h 20 min
- Level
- Challenging
Cite this edition
Wollstonecraft, Mary. Maria; Or, The Wrongs of Woman. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/maria-or-the-wrongs-of-woman.
Wollstonecraft, M. (2026). Maria; or, the wrongs of woman. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/maria-or-the-wrongs-of-woman (Original work published 1798)
Wollstonecraft, Mary. Maria; Or, The Wrongs of Woman. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/maria-or-the-wrongs-of-woman.
@book{wollstonecraft2026maria,
author = {Wollstonecraft, Mary},
title = {Maria; Or, The Wrongs of Woman},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/maria-or-the-wrongs-of-woman},
note = {First published 1798}
}
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What is Maria, or The Wrongs of Woman about?
It follows Maria, a wife locked in a private madhouse by her husband, who wants her fortune. She meets her guard Jemima and a fellow prisoner, Darnford, and her memoir shows how marriage law and poverty trap women.
Is Maria, or The Wrongs of Woman a finished novel?
No. Wollstonecraft died in 1797 before completing it, and the text ends with an editor's outline of possible endings. The chapters give an unfinished story and a clear argument, and the notes show several ways she considered closing it.
Who is Jemima in the novel?
Jemima is the attendant who guards Maria. Born to a servant mother who died, she is abused as a child, forced into the streets and later hardened by her work. She slowly comes to respect Maria.
The author
Mary Wollstonecraft
1759–1797 · English feminist writer and philosopher
Mary Wollstonecraft was an English writer born in London in 1759. She lived in England, Ireland and France. She wrote Mary: A Fiction (1788), A Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790) and A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). She died in London in 1797.
More by Mary Wollstonecraft
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