She was the daughter of a butcher and fated to be slaughtered by a butcher. She had also been chosen by history to replay, in her own way, the heroic role of La Pucelle (Joan of Arc).

Soon after the storming of the prison-fortress of Bastille in Paris, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen had kindled fervent hopes in the bosoms of all the unprivileged classes of French society – aptly called the Third Estate – that consequent upon the overthrow of the despotic Ancien Regime all ancient prejudices and injustices would also be swept away to usher in the golden era of ‘equal opportunity’.

The women of France, in particular, were now sure that time had finally come for the deprived and humiliated half of the population to get their rights as full citizens in an egalitarian order. Their expectations were based on good reason, since most of the revolutionary luminaries – Count Mirabeau, Camille Desmoulins and General Lafayette of American fame – were all well-known liberal and enlightened leaders.

The revolutionary charter had been presented as the new gospel of human equality, even though the words homme (man) and citoyen (male citizen) in the title were creating doubts in the women’s minds. However, the excited women of France had pinned their hopes on the enlightened constitutionalist Count Mirabeau and on Lafayette, the dashing and liberal commander of the National Guard. General Lafayette, a true supporter of the feminine cause, was the Marquis (of Lafayette) who had renounced the aristocratic title to underline his solidarity with the common people, had earlier played an important role in the American Revolution, and was destined to claim participation in three great revolutions (1776 in America, 1789 in France and 1830 again in France). When the inept and haughty king avoided to solve the nation’s political and economic problems and refused to budge from his luxurious palace in Versailles, an armed mob of 7,000 angry and hungry women, escorted by Lafayette, organised an 11-mile march to the royal retreat to loot the glittering palace, famous for its Hall of Mirrors, and force Louis XVI’s return to Paris.

But the doubts persisted and the new constitution, announced in 1791, again failed to address women’s suffrage. After the death of Mirabeau in April 1791, Lafayette was not strong enough to get the necessary amendment to the constitution. And when a representation was made to the revolutionary leaders they simply shrugged their shoulders, exactly like the spineless ‘liberals’ have forever been doing in all parts of the world.

One brave woman was not ready to accept the insult.

 

Gouges’ Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the (female) citizen (Citoyenne) was published in 1791. Among other things, it emphasised that ‘woman is born free and remains equal to man in rights, and laws of nature and reason forbids all actions harmful to society and women.’

 

Marie Gouges’ father was a butcher, and her mother a laundress. Their child was thus destined to live a life of hard work and die namelessly. But the peasant girl had a rebellious spirit. She made up her mind to become a writer. It was indeed an uphill task for the village lass, but she was not daunted. She educated herself, adopted a pen-name (Olympe de Gouges) and went to Paris as an attractive young widow. There she began to frequent influential feminist Mme Roland’s salon. At the time of the revolution she ecstatically welcomed it, writing pamphlets and plays to promote the revolutionary ardour. At this stage another remarkable woman became a source of inspiration for Olympe.

England has produced a number of unforgettable women. Mary Wollstonecraft is certainly one of them. Mother of the author of Frankenstein, the horror classic, mother-in-law of poet Shelley, and wife of William Godwin, the famous political philosopher (and one of the forefathers of the Anarchist movement), Mary Wollstonecraft happened to be a luminary in her own right. The royalist speeches of the arch-conservative English statesman, Edmund Burke, drew forth her revolutionary fervour. She wrote two books – Vindication of the Rights of Man and Vindication of the Rights of Women, which served to galvanise Olympe de Gouges.

Gouges’ Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the (female) citizen (Citoyenne) was published in 1791. Among other things, it emphasised that ‘woman is born free and remains equal to man in rights, and laws of nature and reason forbids all actions harmful to society and women.’

In July 1793 another courageous woman, Charlotte Corday, came into the limelight by kitchen-knifing Jean Marat, the fire-breathing Goebbels of the revolution who used to flourish a pistol while making speeches. This act sparked off the dreadful ‘reign of terror’ of the radical Jacobins. Time had now come for Olympe de Gouges and other female activists to get a taste of equality.

Dr Guillotin was a kind-hearted physician. As a member of the National Assembly he resolved to serve the cause of Egalité in an unbelievably unique manner. ‘Let them have equality in death, if not in life,’ he must have soliloquised, ‘and let the condemned souls – noble or common, educated or unlettered, and male or female – come under the Blade of Equality, and die as quickly and painlessly as possible.’ The outcome was La Guillotine.

Olympe de Gouge shared the Guillotine with royalists and revolutionaries, with the rich and the poor, with the king (Louis XVI) and the queen (Marie Antoinette), with the butchers of the revolution (Robespierre and Saint-Just) and with a great scientist (Lavoisier, father of modern chemistry).

But Lady Luck had refused to smile on the French women. In 1804 Napoleon implemented his famous Code, curtly ordering women to be obedient to their husbands. The chic dames had to wait for 140 years. They received their voting rights in June 1944 alongside the liberation of France from the Nazi occupation.

To pay homage to the brave feminist a road junction has been named Place Olympe de Gouges. Moreover, the 2007 presidential contender, Ségolène Royal, demanded that the ‘remains’ of de Gouges be moved to the Panthéon. ‘Remains’ not being available, she was ceremonially buried there as a symbolic gesture of national gratitude.