Anáhuac Violets
In my recent visit to Museo Nacional de la Estampa, this image that caught my eye:
Of course, it set my research buds on fire. A Mexican literary newspaper called "Violets of Anáhuac" written, edited and published by women, in 1888. Let me repeat this, Mexican women, 1888, writing and publishing.
In a book written by Elvira Hernández Carballido, called Two Violets of Anáhuac, she carefully traces two of the main women of the newspaper, that for two years was not only appreciated by other women but revered by several men from the era.
At the beginning of the 18th Century, Mexican women were not necessarily read or "educated". Perceived as ornamental beings or for mere utilitarian purposes (bearing children and washing clothes), very few publications regarded women as readers.
It was until 1861 that president Benito Juárez decreted women had the right to study, and that is how the School of Arts and Crafts for Women was created. It was in that same institution, some of the women were taught printing press techniques.
Founder and director of the newspaper was Laureana Wright, daughter of Mexican Eulalia González and American father Santiago Wright. She was born in 1846 in the state of Taxco and it was probably her middle-class status that allowed her to have certain privileges such as basic education, other languages, music appreciation, tutors and the passion for science and reading.
To manifest the wish
that our mind dictates
expressing what is felt
sustaining what is believed
Of our abated sex
to deplore the regression
and aspire its comeback
with a longing of a woman.
Answer, 1887
Laurena as a student starts writing poetry for several literary circles and contests where she is highly appreciated by many journalists and male peers. She then, gets married at 23 with Sebastián Kleinhans and raises her only daughter called Margarita.
Her marital status does not take her away from her writing chores which keep her getting into usually closed male groups such as the scientific society "El Porvenir", the Hidalgo Lyceum and the Altamirano of Oaxaca Lyceum.
This is no work of genius,
nor virtue or talent.
It is just the commitment
of a common tendency.
It's doing what
any brain that reaches,
a spark of hope,
a burst of light.
Answer, 1887
It was not until December 1887, that Laureana wrote in her newspaper:
"With an olive branch in our hands, as a sample of the intelectual revival of a woman, animated through the purest teachings of antiquity, that this newspaper is presented today.
We reached to the press as means to fulfill a necessity: to instruct and propagate the faith that the science and the arts inspire. The contemporary woman wants to leave the limbo of ignorance and with open wings, reach the regions of light and truth."
Her writings were not only her personal dwellings but also wrote biographies about other notable women, chosen for their knowledgeability or their moral qualities. Other women poets, actresses and singers were also included in the publications.
She was particularly harsh in regards to the Malinche: "The crazy passion that was inspired by Cortés was the same that acted against the dignity of her lineage, the fidelity of her beliefs and her duties to a nation, which ultimately consecrated her to the destroyer of her own race."
Unfortunately she became ill and Mateana Murgía took over her roles for the remaining of the newspaper publications until 1890 with Laureana's assistance.
Do you want to know who am I?
Rigid dessert, bird of passage,
that reaching the sunset
of my life is where I'm at
anxiously searching for
a woman's elegy,
whose luck is to be understood
moved by it only
that which vegetates with it's life
that which beats with it's might.
I have also become ravenous
enthusiastic even
with the rich splendor
of an ambitious morning
as a slave from the past
thrusting forward to it's future
to guide and redeem
the new generations
uniting it's instructions
to the science of the senses.
Answer, 1888
Mateana was also, a "violet with style":
In life there are memories
joys with no name, immense pain,
doubts, regrets, enchantments, dreams,
white visions, muted specters,
fragrant breezes and chilly winds;
but in the album of my memories
there is only one I keep
fixed, immutable, tenacious, eternal."
Rhimes, Mateana Murgía
She was an elementary school teacher from the state of Jalisco in 1856, then migrated to Mexico City when she was 4 years old. Her father was an renowned doctor, Manuel Murgía, little is known of her mother.
Married when she was 19 to Enrique Stein, she had a daughter baptized as María. One year after, her husband died and that was the main reason she became a teacher in 1878. She was head of the Huichapan School for two years and from 1881 till 1887 she worked as head of another school where she also implemented gymnastics.
She got married again with Tomás Eguiluz in 1885 but tragically, she be widowed only after 26 days after the wedding due to a tifus epidemic in the state of Guanajuato, where they used to live.
She married for the third time in 1887 with journalist Agustín Aveleyra, and soon after she had a boy named after his father. It was that same year, she met Laureana Wright, both became not only friends but collaborators of the newspaper.
In her writings she tried to convince women of not attending the bullfights because she considered it a "crazy hobby" where men were able to "shout out words that could even make a peddler be embarrassed about" and of course, not worthy of women's ears.
More focused in women's virtues, Mateana hated vanity, rivalry, superficiality and pedantic attitudes amongst them. She couldn't understand the indifference some women professed about education and the practice of artistic talent. Modesty and learning how to discern the important from the trivial was a must.
"By a disposition we are not allowed to criticize, male teachers enjoy 60 pesos of income while female teachers only receive 45 pesos! And even though 60 are not enough to cover the expenses of a family that also needs food, laundress, servants, clothes, footwear, etc. The 45 pesos are much less. Yet male teachers are allowed to impart lessons at night in certain homes, aiding their financial situation; but female teachers, most of them young, as long as their weakness is not respected enough by the culture of our compatriots, would do not dare to leave their homes to return at 8 or 9 at night, because they know, they will encounter a thousand impertinences that will nag and pester them; aside from all the intellectual and physical work they had throughout their daily routines that would not only deplete their strength but would leave them with no spirit for new chores."
Four months after she took over the newspaper, publications of the Anáhuac Violets ceased, but she kept writing in other prestigious magazines and her poems were published in literary ones. She passed away at 2 am in 1906 after an illness that kept her in bed with high fevers.
In a book written by Elvira Hernández Carballido, called Two Violets of Anáhuac, she carefully traces two of the main women of the newspaper, that for two years was not only appreciated by other women but revered by several men from the era.
At the beginning of the 18th Century, Mexican women were not necessarily read or "educated". Perceived as ornamental beings or for mere utilitarian purposes (bearing children and washing clothes), very few publications regarded women as readers.
It was until 1861 that president Benito Juárez decreted women had the right to study, and that is how the School of Arts and Crafts for Women was created. It was in that same institution, some of the women were taught printing press techniques.
Founder and director of the newspaper was Laureana Wright, daughter of Mexican Eulalia González and American father Santiago Wright. She was born in 1846 in the state of Taxco and it was probably her middle-class status that allowed her to have certain privileges such as basic education, other languages, music appreciation, tutors and the passion for science and reading.
To manifest the wish
that our mind dictates
expressing what is felt
sustaining what is believed
Of our abated sex
to deplore the regression
and aspire its comeback
with a longing of a woman.
Answer, 1887
Laurena as a student starts writing poetry for several literary circles and contests where she is highly appreciated by many journalists and male peers. She then, gets married at 23 with Sebastián Kleinhans and raises her only daughter called Margarita.
Her marital status does not take her away from her writing chores which keep her getting into usually closed male groups such as the scientific society "El Porvenir", the Hidalgo Lyceum and the Altamirano of Oaxaca Lyceum.
This is no work of genius,
nor virtue or talent.
It is just the commitment
of a common tendency.
It's doing what
any brain that reaches,
a spark of hope,
a burst of light.
Answer, 1887
It was not until December 1887, that Laureana wrote in her newspaper:
"With an olive branch in our hands, as a sample of the intelectual revival of a woman, animated through the purest teachings of antiquity, that this newspaper is presented today.
We reached to the press as means to fulfill a necessity: to instruct and propagate the faith that the science and the arts inspire. The contemporary woman wants to leave the limbo of ignorance and with open wings, reach the regions of light and truth."
Her writings were not only her personal dwellings but also wrote biographies about other notable women, chosen for their knowledgeability or their moral qualities. Other women poets, actresses and singers were also included in the publications.
She was particularly harsh in regards to the Malinche: "The crazy passion that was inspired by Cortés was the same that acted against the dignity of her lineage, the fidelity of her beliefs and her duties to a nation, which ultimately consecrated her to the destroyer of her own race."
Unfortunately she became ill and Mateana Murgía took over her roles for the remaining of the newspaper publications until 1890 with Laureana's assistance.
Do you want to know who am I?
Rigid dessert, bird of passage,
that reaching the sunset
of my life is where I'm at
anxiously searching for
a woman's elegy,
whose luck is to be understood
moved by it only
that which vegetates with it's life
that which beats with it's might.
I have also become ravenous
enthusiastic even
with the rich splendor
of an ambitious morning
as a slave from the past
thrusting forward to it's future
to guide and redeem
the new generations
uniting it's instructions
to the science of the senses.
Answer, 1888
In life there are memories
joys with no name, immense pain,
doubts, regrets, enchantments, dreams,
white visions, muted specters,
fragrant breezes and chilly winds;
but in the album of my memories
there is only one I keep
fixed, immutable, tenacious, eternal."
Rhimes, Mateana Murgía
She was an elementary school teacher from the state of Jalisco in 1856, then migrated to Mexico City when she was 4 years old. Her father was an renowned doctor, Manuel Murgía, little is known of her mother.
Married when she was 19 to Enrique Stein, she had a daughter baptized as María. One year after, her husband died and that was the main reason she became a teacher in 1878. She was head of the Huichapan School for two years and from 1881 till 1887 she worked as head of another school where she also implemented gymnastics.
She got married again with Tomás Eguiluz in 1885 but tragically, she be widowed only after 26 days after the wedding due to a tifus epidemic in the state of Guanajuato, where they used to live.
She married for the third time in 1887 with journalist Agustín Aveleyra, and soon after she had a boy named after his father. It was that same year, she met Laureana Wright, both became not only friends but collaborators of the newspaper.
In her writings she tried to convince women of not attending the bullfights because she considered it a "crazy hobby" where men were able to "shout out words that could even make a peddler be embarrassed about" and of course, not worthy of women's ears.
More focused in women's virtues, Mateana hated vanity, rivalry, superficiality and pedantic attitudes amongst them. She couldn't understand the indifference some women professed about education and the practice of artistic talent. Modesty and learning how to discern the important from the trivial was a must.
"By a disposition we are not allowed to criticize, male teachers enjoy 60 pesos of income while female teachers only receive 45 pesos! And even though 60 are not enough to cover the expenses of a family that also needs food, laundress, servants, clothes, footwear, etc. The 45 pesos are much less. Yet male teachers are allowed to impart lessons at night in certain homes, aiding their financial situation; but female teachers, most of them young, as long as their weakness is not respected enough by the culture of our compatriots, would do not dare to leave their homes to return at 8 or 9 at night, because they know, they will encounter a thousand impertinences that will nag and pester them; aside from all the intellectual and physical work they had throughout their daily routines that would not only deplete their strength but would leave them with no spirit for new chores."
Four months after she took over the newspaper, publications of the Anáhuac Violets ceased, but she kept writing in other prestigious magazines and her poems were published in literary ones. She passed away at 2 am in 1906 after an illness that kept her in bed with high fevers.
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