Unzeitgemäßheit: An introduction to Hedwig Dohm

Hedwig Dohm was a feminist out of her proper time. Discussing the merits and achievements of feminists in our distant past can often be a difficult task. The social ills of their time are not always equivalent to now, and understanding the value of a feminist’s then-bold statement can require delving into the historical and social context of their time. It might be hard to understand the boldness in Christine de Pizan’s cautious advice for young women in 1405 (‘be pure, simple, serene, without vagueness, for the snares of evil men are set for you’ (quoted in Kenyon, 1992, p.8)). Even as late as the nineteenth century, it can be difficult for modern readers to perceive the huge hurdles women were overcoming and the seemingly immoveable social constructs they were challenging (Mirkus, 2014, p.210). Hedwig Dohm is an exception. Although a feminist from the nineteenth century, her arguments are mostly relevant to modern feminist discussion, and often still controversial. She was, in her own time, seen as an extreme radical and had difficulty making close connections in Germany’s feminist movement, and would often avoid taking part in organised movements that brought her into contact with others (Biografie Hedwig Dohm, n.d.). Hedwig Dohm became the first woman in Germany to call for Women’s Suffrage, claiming that political franchise was vital in order for women to achieve the goals they had in mind (Mirkus, 2014, pp.213-214). The fear that women entering politics would erase their femininity is unmasked by Dohm as ‘not so much a fear of a transformation of the feminine character but a blurring, even eradication, of the differences between the sexes’. And the fear that granting the vote to women would undermine the foundations of society (‘downfall - chaos - trumpets - Judgement Day’), something much downplayed by many feminists of the time, Dohm responds to by saying, yes, it would. That was rather the point, to ‘dissolve the social status quo of the today, to tear down the conservatives’ anarchy’ (Mirkus, 2014, pp. 219-220). She exposes men’s desire for women to be merely a pretty face and nothing more, writing that women are welcome as long as they are there solely for ‘man and his pleasure’, but as soon as she ‘appears in public competition with them, or even to instruct them, she becomes un-nature, a vigaro’ (Mirkus, 2014, p.218).

Probably the most striking of all Dohm’s political views was her belief that gender was merely a social construction. As far as Dohm is concerned, nobody should be denied their rights as a human being simply for being born with a ‘female body formation’ (‘weiblicher Körperbildung’) (quoted in Rohner, 2010, p.109). She uses national and class culture as demonstrations of how our environment and upbringing shape who we become, national culture being caused by ‘climate, soil and history’, rather than being predestined (Dohm, 1876 (1976), p.9), and that if you exchanged the children of a peasant and a aristocrat, so that they were raised by one-another’s parents, they would not grow up miraculously showing the traits of their birth parents (Dohm, 1976, p.10). She goes on to apply this same logic to gender, that the qualities of women are ‘a consequence of their social position, their way of living, their education’ (Dohm, 1876 (1976), p.24), and that ‘women are as different from each other in traits of character as men’ (Dohm, 1876 (1976), p.13). She also weighs in on the arguments suggesting that giving women the vote would erode their femininity, pointing out that surely this is an admission that femininity is not inbuilt, but a construct of culture (Dohm, 1876 (1976), pp.27-28). She dismisses theories that the qualities of men and women are prefixed by biological limitations, such as physician Theodor von Bischoff’s proposal that the typically longer legs of men proves that they were the ones meant to go out into the world (Louis, 2006). She is similarly dismissive of the yin-and-yang style argument that men and women were made to balance each other out, the woman of large heart destined to be coupled with the man of large mind. She finds the assumption absurd that a large heart or mind would supplement for a small one, and suggests you could as easily say that a thin man should be married to a fat woman (Louis, 2006). She explains her views on gender quite directly in her 1896 essay Herrenrechte (Men’s Rights), which was written in response to remarks made by opponents to feminism (Diethe, 1996, p.69): ‘Our men's rights activists tend to explain the inferiority of women as mainly due to their nature. Woman's nature! And what of man's nature? Is today's man a natural product of creation? Or is he not, like woman, the outcome of certain historically developed social conditions?’ (FrauenMediaTurm, n.d.).

Biography:

Dohm with her sister, Anna. Date unknown.

Not much is known about Dohm’s early years, except that it was, for her, likely unhappy and frustrating. She was born on the 20th of September, 1831, as Marianne Adelaide Hedwig Jülich, in Berlin. She was the eldest daughter and the third eldest child out of a total of eighteen (Rohner, 2010, p.15). She found her brothers to be noisy and disgusting (Rohner, 2010, p.22) and her relationship with both of her parents was strained. Her father, absent from the house for much of the time, became like a stranger to her, knowing nothing of her life, and she knowing nothing of his (Rohner, 2010, p.23). Her mother was the parental figure in her life, and tried her best to restrict Dohm’s interest in learning, and put her to work on chores and childminding, as was traditional for eldest daughters. Dohm lamented that her reading had to be done in secret, and later used her mother as an example of how women, despite what some people might claim, do not naturally make good mothers (Rohner, 2010, p.22). Dohm tried to pursue what education was available to girls and young women, but found this lacking. For girls, school consisted of rote memory exercises, copying down religious texts as repeated by the teacher until they could be recited by heart, with no opportunity to engage with or discuss anything. Dohm found the lessons to be extremely dull (Rohner, 2010, pp.21-22). In 1848, Dohm undertook a teacher training course. The traditional profession of the woman was as wife and mother, and both a house and children required a woman to surrender her independence to a man (Rohner, 2010, p.23), who would work to upkeep the house, which was to the woman her entire world. Becoming a teacher was one way for a woman to avoid this, and Dohm hoped to use it to ensure some measure of security over her life. She had also hoped that the course would broaden her knowledge beyond what school had offered her, perhaps even introduce her to analytical thinking and scientific studies. In this she was grossly disappointed, as the course merely went over the same materials that Dohm had studied in school. Regardless, she sat through the year’s work and completed the course (Rohner, 2010, p.25). She would not, however, work as a teacher.

Following her graduation, her mother planned a trip to Spain to visit family. A tutor was hired to educate mother and daughter in Spanish. This tutor could not, in fact, speak Spanish, but instead used his Latin and French to give the women a grounding in the grammar and structure of the language. This tutor was Ernst Dohm, a young journalist working as an editor for the satirical magazine Kladderadatsch, and making up for his meagre salary by working as a tutor in his spare time. How exactly Hedwig and Ernst came to be married is not known, but although Hedwig’s mother might have forced the issue, there is no reason to assume the marriage was not mutually desired (especially given Hedwig's feminist views and iron temperament). Ernst was apparently an intelligent and funny man, while Hedwig, not exactly lacking in wit herself, might have seen him and his connections as an escape from her mother’s house and chores, and into the intellectual life she craved. Ernst also worked to support his mother and three sisters (Rohner, 2010, pp.24-25), so he might have held some sympathy for the situation women found themselves in at the time. Regardless, they married on the 21st of March, 1853. They moved to Marienstrasse in Berlin, where they quickly had five children (Hans, Gertrude, Ida, Marie and Eva). They would move a number of times over the next few years, finally settling in Schöneberger Ufer. Their social circle was rich, including such famous names as Franz Liszt, and visits and correspondence with such people was a frequent occurrence. However, the years of pregnancies were hard for Dohm, and she became suicidal in her final pregnancy, due to how confined such a state made her. She took solace in translating Spanish texts into German, and later credited such intellectual work as having been beneficial to her pregnancy and mental health, counter to the speculations of some critics of feminism, who believed maternity was the task of women in place of intellectual pursuits (Rohner, 2010, p.26).

Dohm's daughters (from left to right), Eva, Marie, Ida and Gertrude.

Even after her final child was born, Dohm was not safe from emotional hardships. In 1866, her first child and only son, Hans, died of scarlet fever (Rohner, 2010, p.34). The following year saw Dohm’s first major publication, a study of Spanish literature, Die Spanische National-Literatur (Mirkus, 2014, p.212). There is no way to be certain if her son’s death drove Dohm to seek distractions, similar to her depression during pregnancy driving her to translate Spanish, but the speed of the work certainly shows it as a possible channel for her grief (Rohner, 2010, p.34). In 1869, the household had fallen into severe debt, and Ernst Dohm was forced to flee Berlin to avoid arrest. The children went to stay with various relatives (Rohner, 2010, p.35), while Dohm stayed with her sister Anna in Rome. Why Dohm did not go with her husband we cannot know for certain, but it might indicate that she needed some time away from him (Rohner, 2010, p.104). After a year, with the aid of friends, Ernst Dohm’s debts were settled and the family were able to reunite in Berlin in 1870 (Mirkus, 2014, p.214). It was after this sojourn in Rome that Dohm would begin publishing the feminist works that made her famous, seeming so radical that even other feminists felt that she was too bold (Rohner, 2010, p.62). Her first was Was die Pastoren von den Frauen denken (What the Pastors Think of Women) in 1872. It was her 1873 work, however, Der Jesuitismus im Hausstande (Jesuitism in the Household), where she would first demand women’s suffrage, becoming the first woman in Germany to publically do so (Mirkus, 2014, p.213). She was precise and analytical in her criticisms of society and her justifications for reform, saying that if women are to be subject to the law, then they should have some say in the creation of the law, and to do otherwise is tyranny (Rohner, 2010, p.65). In her 1875 work Der Frauen Natur und Recht (Women's Nature and Privilege), she says that women are the product of the opportunities given to them, but also of the expectations society makes of them. She also criticises the notion that childbearing somehow barred women from political franchise, suggesting that you could just as easily say that men not bearing children should bar them, and neither statement would be more profound (Rohner, 2010, p.66).

The title page of Dohm's first major publication, Die Spanische National-Literatur.

By 1880, Dohm had stepped away from writing critical feminist works, as she felt that her efforts were going ignored, and most women seemed content to do nothing about their situation. On top of this, her husband Ernst’s health had begun to decline (Rohner, 2010, p.72), and he would die in 1883 (Mirkus, 2014, p.213). This year would see the beginning of Dohm’s career as a fiction writer, although her fiction was loaded with political messages and continued to discuss feminist issues. By the time her husband died, her children had grown up and moved out, so Dohm now lived alone. Women were expected to devote their lives to the house and family, and having other hobbies was frowned upon. So, once the children and husband were gone, the woman was left without purpose. Dohm’s most famous novel, Werde die du bist (Be who you are), would focus upon this theme, with the protagonist being left feeling empty and useless once her husband and children were gone (Rohner, 2010, p.104). However she might have depicted the protagonists of her books, Dohm did not let Ernst’s death knock her down. She would continue her writing, and actively sought out writers and analytical thinkers and invited them to her house regularly, to discuss various subjects, primarily literature (Rohner, 2010, p.107). Towards the end of the 1880s, a new generation of feminists were making waves on the scene. Not satisfied with the moderate stance that their predecessors had taken, this new blood was following Dohm’s radical example. Years later in 1909, Dohm would joke that ‘regarding the woman’s question, you know, I have been like a ruminant for decades’ (Dohm: Louis, 2006). In this new climate of radical feminism, Dohm felt more welcomed and began to participate more actively and publically than she had ever done before. In 1888 she was a founding member of the Verein Frauenwohl (Society for Women’s Wellbeing), and in 1905 she would become president of the Deutscher Bund für Mutterschutz und Sexualreform (German Association for Maternity Protection and Sexual Reform) (Rohner, 2010, p.109).

A sketch of Kladderadatsch's editors in 1867. Hedwig's husband Ernst is on the left.

From 1893, Dohm would begin writing for various newspapers and journals (Rohner, 2010, p.110). Among her most notable works from this period involved her discussion of anti-feminists, those who opposed her for a number of reasons. Possibly the most famous of these would be Friedrich Nietzsche, who, despite writing philosophy regarding personal freedom that would inspire many feminists into action (Diethe, 1996, p.70), did not apply these philosophies to women himself. He felt, instead, that men should regard women as their property (Rohner, 2010, p.113), and that the only true profession for women is to birth healthy babies (Diethe, 1996, p.71). Nietzsche dreamed of a future ruled by superior human beings, the Übermensch. He believed that women needed to accept a subservient role for his Übermensch future to become a reality, looking to ancient Greece and its subjugated women as an example, convinced that its success was directly linked to it being a patriarchy. His hatred for feminists was driven by a fear that their actions to liberate themselves would destroy this future, and he felt that they deserved all the abuse they got as punishment. To Nietzsche, modern society had twisted the natural role of women (that is, birthing and rearing children), and any woman who expressed interest in learning was sexually damaged in some way. Nietzsche was a supporter of the right of women to enjoy sex and sexuality, although given his views on the role of women in society, this was likely only because he saw children as their only goal in life (Diethe, 1996, p.73). Another critic of feminism was Otto Weininger, who mocked suggestions by feminists that women should do more to develop themselves as people, rather than exist as characters in their husband’s lives. In 1903 he wrote that ‘man alone is a microcosm, a mirror of the universe ... Animals are mere individuals; women are persons, although they are not personalities’ (quoted in Diethe, 1996, p.72).

Hedwig Dohm’s writing is characterised by her sarcasm and sharp wit, which was often turned on these anti-feminists. In Der Frauen Natur und Recht, she writes that ‘men think that they themselves have the qualities which they deny in women [. . .] if a man says, “A woman has no logic,” he thinks to himself, “Who possesses logic? I do, of course. She has no originality, ergo, I am original. What a good thing for me that God has created woman as a foil for me! Otherwise no one would observe how productive, original and logical I am.”’ (Dohm, 1876 (1976), p.23). Some took issue with her tone, and accusations were laid before Dohm that she hated men, that she wanted ‘nothing [to do] with a man, [but] everything against the man‘ (Der Spiegel, n.d.). Once, when attending a party, one man remarked upon seeing Dohm: ‘typical Blaumstruempfe (Bluestocking), can't get any, and now wants to take it out on men. Bony old horse’ (quoted in Louis, 2006). In Die Antifeministen, Dohm would write in response: 'I do not turn against people, but against ideas [. . .] my pen is but a shield to ward off the deadly jokes one might make of me as a woman' (quoted in Der Spiegel, n.d.). She then goes on to discuss the opponents to feminism, suggesting that there are two types of anti-feminist: ones that base their arguments upon the notion that women are biologically inferior, and those that disguise their attacks within concern to preserve the woman as ‘priestess of the domestic hearth’, that is, their traditional role keeping a man’s house.

1903 saw Dohm publish Die alte Frau (The Old Woman), a discussion of feminism in relation to age, and whether the women’s movement was doing enough for older women. She argues that, as men typically reduce women to sexual objects, a woman becomes valueless once she grows old, as she is neither sexually attractive enough for men nor is she capable of reproduction. When a man no longer sees a woman as an object of his desires, he loses interest in talking to her at all. And, on top of this, in Germany in the early 1900s it was death to one’s social life to be regarded as useless, as women past their menopause often were (Bernier-Monod, 2013, p.28). Dohm’s suggestion for fellow elderly women is not to allow society to impose this social death on them, and to instead withdraw from social life voluntarily, for ‘when we do not expect anything from society, we have no reason to fear it’ (quoted in Bernier-Monod, 2013, p.28). She suggests that elderly women instead use their time to learn, despite beliefs at the time that age withered the capacity to learn. She cites a friend who practices Latin as a means of exercising her memory. She also proposes mysticism as an alternative to a social life, where one communes with nature instead of human beings, and contemplates the ancient stars (Bernier-Monod, 2013, pp.28-29). Here, Dohm is attempting to fill a void that society carves into old women, leaving them feeling useless and abandoned. These proposed solutions were no doubt Dohm’s own methods to maintain her mental health in her later years, and she hopes to extend them to others.

Hedwig Dohm, around 1910.

By 1914, Dohm was 83 and living in the Wannsee locality of Berlin. Despite her age, she showed no sign or interest in retiring. However, whatever plans she might have had in the summer were derailed by the outbreak of the First World War (at this time called Der Große Krieg). The reaction throughout much of Germany was jubilant, patriotism swelled, and young men lined up in the millions to go off and fight for their country, convinced by propaganda that they’d all be home by Christmas (‘Weihnachten sind wir zu Hause!’). Dohm, being a pacifist (Mirkus, 2014, p.213), was distraught, particularly when close friends and fellow feminists expressed enthusiasm. She felt that the war would be a huge loss of life and additionally could only be damaging to the women’s movement (Rohner, 2010, pp.126-127). Dohm had written to oppose the rising national sentiment in Germany before, as well as anti-Semitism, but the war would bring out a more concentrated effort. It became the focus of her writing, and she specifically looked for publications taking a pacifist stance, a difficult search. Dohm was one of very few openly opposing the war, and being a radical voice opposing seemingly everybody else might have reminded her of her experiences as a radical feminist in the 1870s. In her search, she would find Das Land Goethes (The Land of Goethe), which wanted to glorify Germany for its poetic triumphs, rather than military. For this publication Dohm would write Wäre ich ein glühender Patriot (Were I a Fervent Patriot) in 1916. A truncated translation follows: ‘were I a fervent patriot [. . .] I would sing a lofty song to the heroism of the German people [. . .] were I a fatalist, I would say: it is the destiny of nations to destroy each other from time to time [. . .] were I the Devil, I would laugh [ . . .] at the victory that Hell had won [. . .] I am a human - nothing but a human. And for this war I should cry, cry until my eyes are blinded by tears’ (quoted in Rohner, 2010, p.128).

In 1915 she wrote Der Mißbrauch des Todes (The Misuse of Death), although it would not see publication until 1917 (Mirkus, 2014, pp.213-214), possibly owing to Dohm’s new publication standards. She would open by declaring ‘I cannot participate in the showy patriotic pathos of the fashion of the wartime years’. This is is also a very poetic work, displaying Dohm’s extreme skill with words, although unfortunately much is lost in an English translation. Dohm begins with statement that, regardless of what people might want to think, Europeans are no more cultured than primeval beings, especially when war beckons: ‘In war, the laws of mankind are abolished, and returned to their primordial state [. . .] the war lends countless mouths, that of the guns which are insatiably devoted to human consumption’. Of the many young sent away to die, she laments: ‘The devil whets the sickle of death, so he can mow down a whole generation of youthful bloom [. . .] why give creatures life when, scarcely realised, war takes them back?’. In death, she realises, the nation will glorify them: ‘Not every soldier carries the Marshal's baton in his knapsack, yet a commandment from Peter opens the gates of Heaven to him, and as an avowed spirit he walks through to immortality. Every soldier a hero, a darling of God’. Her discussion of the fighting evokes many Christian themes, with her ultimately condemning war as ‘the most wicked of all blasphemies’. She writes ‘the god of war is like the hyena that feeds on corpses [. . .] he turns all Christian commandments into their opposite. "Thou shalt not kill." But - but you shall kill, the more the better.' She evokes the commandment ‘Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house’, pointing out that in war, ‘thou shalt covet not only his house, but even his land, his life thou shalt covet. This is what war wants’ (Der Spiegel, n.d.).

Dohm would live to see the end of the war, although the world was clearly far from peaceful, and Dohm could not easily forget the tragedy that had transpired (Rohner, 2010, p.129). She also lived to see the establishment of Women’s Suffrage, the goal she had worked towards for the last 46 years, in January of 1919. On the first of June that year, Hedwig Dohm died at the age of 87 (Mirkus, 2014, p.214). Her daughters were with her as she passed away, and record her dying words as ‘das also war das Leben’ (‘So that was life’) (quoted in Rohner, 2010, p.130). Her works would slip from public consciousness until being rediscovered by German feminists in the 1970’s. They were startled that this nineteenth century feminist, contrary to expectations, had taken feminism further than their own modern movement had considered. These modern feminists were excited, but also afraid; if such progress could be made and then simply lost, who’s to say it couldn’t happen again (EMMA, 2001)? Regardless, Dohm enjoyed a revival, and is now a respected figure in German feminist tradition. Her name has been lent to a certificate of achievement awarded by the Journalistinnenbund (Journalist’s Association) (Journalistinnenbund, n.d.), and a street in Berlin (Meinestadt, Stuttgart, 2015). Sadly, Hedwig Dohm remains largely unknown outside of Germany. The purpose of this little essay was to introduce English speakers to Dohm, so that their interest might be piqued further. Hopefully this goal was achieved.

Further reading:

Rohner, I. (2010) ‘Spuren ins Jetzt: Hedwig Dohm - eine Biografie’, Helmer Ulrike.

Dohm, H, Campbell, C. (1976) ‘Women's Nature and Privilege (Pioneers of the Woman's
Movement)’, Hyperion Press.

Dohm, H, Ametsbichler, E. (2006) ‘Become Who You Are: With an Additional Essay, "The Old
Woman" (Suny Series, Women Writers in Translation)’, State University of New York Press.

Mirkus, B. (2014) ‘Political Woman in Print: German Women's Writing 1845-1919’, Peter Lang
AG, Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften.

Bibliography:

Rohner, I. (2010) ‘Spuren ins Jetzt: Hedwig Dohm - eine Biografie’, Helmer Ulrike.

Bernier-Monod, A. (2013) 'Lève-toi! Aie le courage de vivre! » : Lecture commentée de « La vieille femme » d’Hedwig Dohm, pionnière du féminisme allemand' Recherches féministes 262, pp.25-35.

Diethe, C. (1996) 'Nietzsche and the Early German Feminists' Journal of Nietzsche Studies, No. 12, pp. 69-81.

Dohm, H, Campbell, C. (1976) ‘Women's Nature and Privilege (Pioneers of the Woman's
Movement)’, Hyperion Press.

Dohm, H, Ametsbichler, E. (2006) ‘Become Who You Are: With an Additional Essay, "The Old
Woman" (Suny Series, Women Writers in Translation)’, State University of New York Press.

Louis, C. (2006) ‘Dohm: Radikal & Brillant’ [Online]. Available at
http://www.emma.de/artikel/hedwig-dohm-radikal-brillant-264230 (Accessed 22 March 2017).

EMMA, (2001) ‘So fing es an!’ [Online]. Available at
http://www.emma.de/artikel/die-jahre-1971-bis-1975-so-fing-es-264242 (Accessed 30 May 2017).

Mirkus, B. (2014) ‘Political Woman in Print: German Women's Writing 1845-1919’, Peter Lang
AG, Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften.

Rohner, I, (n.d.) ‘Biografie Hedwig Dohm’ [Online]. Available at
http://www.hedwigdohm.de/biografie-hedwig-dohm/ (Accessed 22 March 2017).

Meinestadt, (2015) ‘Hedwig-Dohm-Str., Stuttgart’ [Online]. Available at http://www.meinestadt.de/stuttgart/stadtplan/strasse/hedwig-dohm-str. (Accessed 30 May 2017)

Journalistinnenbund, (n.d.) ‘Hedwig-Dohm-Urkunde’ [Online]. Available at https://www.journalistinnen.de/hedwig-dohm-urkunde/hedwig-dohm-urkunde/ (Accessed 30 May 2017)

FrauenMediaTurm (n.d.) ‘Herrenrechte’ [Online]. Available at http://www.frauenmediaturm.de/themen-portraets/feministische-pionierinnen/hedwig-dohm/auswahlbibliografie/herrenrechte/ (Accessed 30 May 2017)

Der Spiegel, (n.d.) ‘Der Mißbrauch des Todes’ [Online]. Available at http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/buch/-4769/1 (Accessed 30 May 2017)

Der Spiegel, (n.d.) ‘Die Antifeministen’ [Online]. Available at http://gutenberg.spiegel.de/buch/die-antifeministen-4774/1 (Accessed 30 May 2017)