Category: Top Ten Spinsters

Arguably the most powerful monarch in history, Queen Elizabeth I tops this list of Top 10 Real-Life Spinsters.

Why She Makes the List

Though not the first female ruler of England, Queen Elizabeth I was certainly the most famous. During a time when women were very commonly believed to be inherently feeble, lesser beings than men, Elizabeth’s ascension and successful reign set a precedent that was seen throughout the entire world. The impact that that visibility had is incalculable.

Her Life as a Single Woman

Elizabeth’s decision to remain a virgin (that is, an unmarried woman of good virtue without children) was controversial within her own court. But the young queen knew what she was doing. She had seen the difficulties and divided power that plagued her older sister’s marriage as well as her cousin Mary Queen of Scots. Elizabeth must have realized that the only way to remain both free and sovereign was to remain unmarried. And so she announced, shortly after her coronation, that she saw herself as already married – to the country of England.

Her Choice to Remain Childfree

It may be inaccurate to say that a maiden in Tudor times chose to be childfree, as no unmarried woman could have a child and claim to be virtuous. Elizabeth certainly could never have had a child out of wedlock (despite the fact that male rulers did it regularly). However, we can safely say that Elizabeth did not wish to have a child.

Her refusal to marry upset her advisers primarily because it meant that she would have no heir. The danger, chaos, and blood that surrounded the transfer of power through Henry VIII’s children left a deep mark on the country. No one wanted to risk creating such a situation again. So when Elizabeth insisted upon remaining a virgin, her advisers encouraged her to at least name an heir. She also refused this.

While her father had been desperate for an heir to his throne, Elizabeth saw this as a threat to her power. Even on her deathbed, she refused to name an heir for fear of them trying to kill or usurp her before her life had ended. Thus, Elizabeth I was truly a spinster.

Her Legacy

Queen Elizabeth I’s reign, much more than her older sister Mary’s, paved the way for future female monarchs of England. On a more individual note, Elizabeth’s bold decision to remain the sole ruler of her kingdom should be inspiration to us all.

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Susan B. Anthony is one of the most iconic and accomplished spinsters the world has ever known.

It’s difficult to overstate the role of Susan B. Anthony in the rise of equal rights in the United States. While countless suffragists contributed to the eventual acceptance of women in governance, no single figure stands out quite as prominently.

Her Life & Work

Susan B. Anthony made achieving equal rights for women her life’s vocation. Born in 1820, Anthony was raised with the egalitarian beliefs of her Quaker family. At the age of only 17 she already worked for the American Anti-Slavery Society. She worked almost ceaselessly for the abolition of slavery, equal wages for women, as well as women’s right to vote.

She also became close friends with fellow famous suffragist Elizabeth Cady Stanton. The pair worked together often, though Anthony complained that Stanton wasted too much of her time pregnant, raising children, and tending to her husband.

In her prolific life, Anthony founded:

• The Revolution newspaper
• Women’s Loyal National League
• American Equal Rights Association
• and co-authored the History of Women Suffrage with Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Why She Makes the List

In addition to all of the incredible work she did toward women’s suffrage, Anthony was the epitome of the American spinster. When question about her lack of husband, she said, “I never felt I could give up my life of freedom.” She also noted that a poor woman became a drudge when she married, and a rich woman a ‘doll.’ Anthony couldn’t be happy with either. While her lifelong friend Stanton married and had child after child (even after she wished to stop), Anthony was unwilling to sacrifice that amount of time and energy. She devoted it all to the cause.

In Closing

Susan B. Anthony truly had the mindset that failure was impossible. Her steadfast, unwavering belief in the inevitability of her cause of true equal rights galvanized her peers and followers, and ultimately brought about the changes she foresaw. She seemed wholly unflappable, appearing every year for thirty-seven years before a congress that laughed at her cause and her persistence. Her tenacity, perseverance, and dedication continue to inspire even to this day.

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Whether you love her or hate her, Oprah proved that a woman can be a success by every measure without a husband or children.

Oprah Winfrey’s Story

Oprah was born into poverty in rural Mississippi in 1954. Her mother was still a teenager, unmarried and under-educated. For the early portion of her life, it appeared Oprah would be forced to follow in her mother’s footsteps. She was molested repeatedly as a child, leading to a pregnancy at age 14.

It was when she avoided being sent away to a facility for troubled girls, and when her child died in infancy, that the young Oprah felt she had been given a second chance. She resolved to rise above the circumstances in which she had been born. Never again would anyone else be in charge of her life.

Her hard work, tenacity, and opportunism would eventually pay off when she landed her own daytime talk show. The rest is history.

Why Oprah makes the list

As mentioned earlier, Oprah has gotten a lot of hate over the years. Critics claim she’s only in it for the ratings, she has more money than she ought to, she’s ego-centric, etc. While much of this is rooted in sexism and racism*, there’s something else about Oprah that grates on people’s nerves. I think some of the reasons people dislike Oprah are the same reasons people dislike the happily single and childfree in general.

*When a white man like Steve Jobs earns a fortune and publicly praises himself for it, why do we join in the applause instead of berating him?

For instance:

• We’re perceived to have more money.
• Choosing self-love over self-martyrdom is seen as “selfish” or “ego-centric.”
• Mothers who regret having children resent our decision to avoid them in the first place.
• Women who are that happy without the ‘traditional’ life are seen as uppity or immoral.

Here’s the reason Oprah ranks so highly on this list: She’s a happy, self-fulfilled, successful woman who is fully satisfied without husband or children. She is the spinster success story, and her visibility is vital to the rest of us.

Try as her detractors might, they cannot seem to catch Oprah Winfrey feeling sad and unfulfilled. Her lack of children and missing wedding band don’t seem to keep her up at night. And worst of all, she doesn’t seem to feel the need to apologize for her happiness and her wise decisions.

If anyone had an excuse to give up, marry young, and start having babies, it was Oprah. But she turned her back on all that she knew and aspired to happiness. Whatever you think about her talk show or beliefs, her success as a spinster she should be an inspiration to us all.

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“Anything is to be preferred or endured rather than marrying without Affection.”

Of course Jane Austen was going to be on this list of Top 10 Real-Life Spinsters. Though she herself was not well known during her lifetime, today she is an inspiration to women, particularly happily single and childfree women, everywhere.

For any new reader of Austen’s work, it may initially come as a surprise that she never married. After all, she wrote almost entirely about happy, love-based marriages in the upper middle and upper classes. How is it that she herself was a lifelong spinster?

Spinsterhood in Victorian England

In Austen’s lifetime and social class, marriage was a responsibility to one’s family. For a woman, making a successful match ensured that one’s parents would be well-cared for in their old age. It was also most women’s only way of securing an income. For an upper middle class woman, a career would have been inappropriate (Austen herself remained an anonymous author until after her death). That left marriage as the only way to secure the future of one’s family.

However, with that responsibility came the loss of much of a woman’s autonomy. Though it might be difficult for modern readers to believe, had Austen married she would very likely have had to give up her career as a writer. Marriage in Victorian England (as mentioned in Anne Brontë‘s section on this list) was unfavorable to women. For instance:

• That a woman obeyed her husband wasn’t just a religious preference – it was law.
• Contraception would have been out of the question.
• All income earned by a woman would have belonged to her husband.
• Her children belonged to her husband.
• She would – quite literally – have belonged to her husband.

If a woman managed to secure a marriage to a wealthy man of good social standing who was also progressive in his attitude toward his wife, this could all work out fine. But there’s no denying that marriage was a great risk for any independent woman. Many scholars believe that it is this reason – the retention of her freedom and pursuit of her career – that Austen never married.

Why this makes Jane Austen an inspirational spinster

Jane Austen expert David Lassman says that this notion,

“…suggests that [Austen] was not only a literary genius but a forward-thinking woman, an independent mind, an astute business person and a feminist pioneer – one who can easily take her place alongside such luminaries as Mary Astell and Mary Wollstonecraft – rolled into one.”

Had marriage been the somewhat more egalitarian institution that it is today, perhaps Jane Austen would have married one of her beaus and continued to create masterpieces of English literature. Perhaps she would still have preferred spinsterhood. As it was, however, the only way for a self-sufficient woman to remain so was to remain a spinster. And her fans are very glad she did.

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Helen Keller’s fame is such that every school child knows her name and has learned about her life.

Helen Keller’s Story

As an infant, Keller contracted measles. Though this wasn’t uncommon during the time, the disease left her both blind and deaf. The loss of two primary senses while still a baby meant that as young Helen grew older she didn’t learn to speak or communicate in any meaningful way. Keller herself says that she had no real thoughts at this time, just animalistic wants. As she continued to age, her devoted parents began to fear for her future.

Consequently, when Keller was six her parents employed Annie Sullivan, known to history as “the miracle worker.” Sullivan arrived at the Kellers’ estate and took complete charge of Helen’s care. She cut her off from her indulgent parents and their servants, moving her to a small guest house where teacher and unwilling pupil lived together. The best-known part of Annie’s teaching was manipulating Keller’s fingers to form letters and words in sign language.

The Miracle Worker

The most famous moment in Helen Keller’s life is, of course, when Sullivan signed the letters “W-A-T-E-R” into Helen’s hand while running water over it. It was in this moment that Helen had the realization that these finger movements were names, and that all things around her had them.

She writes:

As the cool stream gushed over one hand [Annie Sullivan] spelled into the other the word water, first slowly, then rapidly. I stood still, my whole attention fixed upon the motions of her fingers. Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten — a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that “w-a-t-e-r” meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand. That living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free! There were barriers still, it is true, but barriers that could in time be swept away.

I left the well-house eager to learn. Everything had a name, and each name gave birth to a new thought. As we returned to the house every object which I touched seemed to quiver with life. That was because I saw everything with the strange, new sight that had come to me.

This is the miraculous story that nearly everyone knows. The story of a teacher and child who achieved what none had ever done before. But there’s so much more to Helen’s incredible life.

Helen Keller’s Secret Engagement

One of the lesser known chapters of Keller’s life came years later when she was an adult. While attitudes toward the differently-abled continue to slowly change for the better, at that time people as severely disabled as Keller generally did not marry or have children. Though Keller gained remarkable independence, she still relied on translations from Annie Sullivan to understand the world around her. Braille and sign language where more obscure then than they are today, so few people had the means to communicate with her directly.

One of the minority of people who could communicate with Keller was Peter Fagan. Fagan was hired as a temporary secretary to Helen while Annie Sullivan vacationed. The two fell deeply in love, and planned to marry. Fagan even applied for a marriage license. But it was the license, sadly, that brought about the end of their relationship.

Keller and Fagan planned to elope, but though Helen arrived at the appointed time and waited, Peter never showed up at their rendezvous. The press had found out about their marriage license, and published a sensational article about it. Keller’s mother read it, and forbade Fagan from ever returning or seeing her daughter again.

Why Helen Keller makes the list

In light of all this, it may seem odd to put Helen Keller on a list of Top 10 Spinsters, particularly at number 5. After all, Keller’s spinsterhood was not by choice. She even said that if she could see, the first thing she would do would be to marry. However, it is this very fact that makes her all the more inspiring to me.

Despite being devastated by her loss of her true love, and the unfairness of discrimination against the blind, Keller persevered. Rather than become a bitter recluse, (a la Miss Havisham), she carried on. She continued to learn and to speak out against societal wrongs. Though she realized that as a blind and deaf woman she would never be permitted to marry, she didn’t simply accept her lot and despair. She owned her spinster life. Helen Keller did more as a single woman than many people accomplish in a lifetime. Even though it wasn’t her first choice, she lived a truly amazing life as a single, childfree woman.

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#6: Greta Garbo

Greta Garbo and Lillian Gish (both film stars from 1920s) were contenders for this spot on the list, but while Gish is still better known for her stardom rather than her spinsterhood, Garbo has become most remembered for her desire for solitude. While Garbo insists that she herself never said “I want to be alone” (she says her actual words were “I want to be left alone,” and emphasized the difference between the two phrases), she did utter that line in the film Grand Hotel, leading to her image forever being tied to that single sentence.

However it’s undeniable that Garbo did indeed want to be left alone. Though she loved acting from childhood, she disliked the attention her career brought. She became famous off-screen for snubbing Hollywood, preferring her privacy to its social parties.

It is also clear that while she was in love with her on-again, off-again lover and fellow actor John Gilbert, she refused to get married. She is quoted as fearing that Gilbert would try to “boss” her if they became husband and wife. Later she said, “There are some who want to get married and others who don’t. I have never had an impulse to go to the altar. I am a difficult person to lead.”

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If you’d like to learn more about Greta Garbo, here are a few recommended resources.

GretaGarbo.com

Greta Garbo: Divine Star

Garbo: A Biography

See the full list of Top 10 Real-Life Spinsters here.

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7. Emily Dickinson

One of history’s most famous reclusive writers.

Dickinson, from the outside, may have been the image of a madwoman in the attic. However, her extreme social phobia didn’t prevent her from being an incredibly prolific (albeit, posthumous) poet. Dickinson wrote about 1800 poems, but published less than a dozen during her life. This apparent shyness could be due to what many scholars now see as an anxiety disorder. Dickinson effectively retreated from society in her twenties, rarely leaving the house in her older years. She was even reported to have once fled from the sound of neighbors approaching her home. The only company she seems to have enjoyed was that of her family, a few close friends, and some of the neighborhood children.

Whether her aversion to most social interactions was truly the result of a medical condition or simply a desire to live a cloistered life, Dickinson used her time alone to create volumes of poetry that are beloved throughout the world today. Her lyrical style, descriptive imagery, and universal themes have given her a level of fame she never wanted in life.

Though some scholars speculate Emily Dickinson had a secret love interest (derived from passionate letters written only to “Master”), she never had any open romantic relationships. And although she got along well with children, her poems don’t mention of any longing for one of her own. She was a spinster until the very end.

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 8. Anne Brontë

Writer, Social Critic, Lifelong Spinster

Of the three sisters (Charlotte, Emily, and Anne), only Anne Brontë makes this list. While Charlotte’s Jane Eyre rightly receives praise for its surprisingly strong-willed and independent female protagonist, Charlotte – like Jane – was happily married. The other two sisters remained unmarried until their early deaths, and Anne in particular made a somewhat revolutionary stand against the very image of marriage that Victorians so idealized.

Critique of Marriage

Anne Brontë ‘s novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall shines a light on the extreme lack of control married women had over their own lives and the well being of their children. In Victorian England, women could rarely sue for divorce, even in abusive situations. Further, a woman who fled from her husband could be charged with theft, since her income was legally her husband’s. If she fled with her children, she could even be charged with kidnapping. Wildfell Hall exposes these injustices as they occurred in real life.

The novel sold out within weeks of its first printing, and remained popular in Anne’s lifetime. This was due largely to the then-scandalous nature of the story. While it may not have fared well over time, it presented an unflinching look at the misery Victorian wives sometimes endured.

Personal Life and Spinsterhood

Anne’s own life was a picture of the struggle unmarried women faced. Thanks to a limited number of acceptable professions for women, she constantly struggled financially. Like her sister Emily, Anne supported herself by working, mainly as a governess and a writer. Wildfell Hall was initially published under a male pseudonym, which likely contributed to its success.

There are no records of courtship, marriage proposals, or even romances in Anne’s life. Her only dying regret was that she believed she had accomplished very little with her time on earth.

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Next up on our Sunday list of real-life spinsters comes the Lady of the Lamp…

9. Florence Nightingale

Famous for her role in the Crimean War, Florence Nightingale revolutionized how nursing was seen and practiced, especially regarding the treatment of soldiers during foreign wars. She was also a gifted mathematician, and turned her keen and logical mind toward the prevention of illness in hospitals. Many of the very common practices involving sanitation that we take for granted today gained attention through her work.

While Nightingale may sometimes falls short of the modern definition of a feminist, her ideas about women’s roles and responsibilities were very forward-thinking for the time. In fact, her contributions to the practice of medicine drastically changed Victorians’ ideas about women working in traditionally male fields.  Her achievements are even more impressive when we consider that she was from a prominent aristocratic family, in which women didn’t hold jobs.

Nightingale is an inspirational, real-life spinster because she didn’t let social standards dictate her life. She had a dream and pursued it, despite the fact that it had never been done before. By daring to show her mental brilliance, she proved that women and men could be intellectual equals. And through it all she lived devoutly single life.

In short, she broke down nearly every Victorian stereotype about women, pushing us all into the modern age.

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If you’d like to learn more about Florence Nightingale’s incredible life, here are a few excellent resources:

• Books

Florence Nightingale: The Making of a Radical Theologian

Life or Death in India

• Website

3 Ways Florence Nightingale Brought Innovation to Nursing

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Each Sunday for the next two months, The American Spinster will be counting down our list of Top Ten Real-Life Spinsters. These brief biographies will examine the lives of extraordinary single, childfree women who left their mark on the world and made a name for themselves in history. Starting the list of is Joan of Arc.

10. Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc is famous for leading the French army against the English during the Hundred Years War, turning the tide and helping France gain the upper hand. Know also as the Maid of Orleans, the young, uneducated peasant girl claimed she experienced visions from Heaven instructing her to lead the army to victory.

Despite being untrained in any type of war strategy and having no known relatives of a higher station, she was able to convince the members of the court that she and her divine instructions were meant to lead the army. For a 17 year old girl, particularly one of no noteworthy background, to become a military leader in 15^th century France was a truly unprecedented accomplishment.

Joan was eventually captured, traded to the English, and faced accusation by the church. Impressively, Joan was reported to have bested her accusers in argument during her trial, causing the remainder to be held behind closed doors. Despite her bravery and skill, Joan was ultimately burned alive as a heretic at the age of 19. She was has long been revered as a martyr and heroine of France, and in 1920 she was canonized as a saint.

Why she makes the Top 10 List

Due to her early death, it isn’t clear whether or not Joan would have remained a spinster. But whether her visions were divinely inspired or she was a strategic prodigy, she inspired centuries of ‘maiden’ women. This youthful, unmarried girl attained a very high-ranking position in a male-only field. And if she could, why can’t we all?

Want to learn more?

To learn the details about Joan of Arc, I recommend the following resources:

• Books

Joan of Arc: By Herself and Her Witness

Joan of Arc: Her Story

• DVD

Joan of Arc: Virgin Warrior

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