SOURCE: Hartmann, Van C. “Tory Feminism in Mary Astell's Bart'lemy Fair.” The Journal of Narrative Technique 28, No. 3 (Fall 1998): 243-65.

In the following essay, Hartmann examines Astell's Bart'lemy Fair: Or, An Enquiry After Wit in the context of her life, work, and times, comparing it to similar literature of the era, primarily the works of Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope.

Although Mary Astell has received considerable scholarly attention over the past two decades, that scholarship has focused primarily on her writings about marriage and the education of women; only secondarily have critics taken note of Astell's energetic espousal of religious and political ideas most often associated with the male Tory satirists. Because Astell's writings seemed to straddle two conflicting ideologies, one an apparent challenge to patriarchal society, and the other a spirited defense of the old patriarchal order, otherwise enthusiastic scholars, from Regina Janes to Felicity Nussbaum, have sometimes...