"Herland" Doesn't Empower 'Our Women'

The novel Herland, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is centered around motherhood. Everything in the land of women is nurtured, from its fruit bearing trees to its young girls. The novel sheds light on the corruption of our patriarchal society while challenging what femininity and motherhood is. However, in the process the message put forth is not entirely pure.

The idea that not all women should have children is very prevalent in Herland, and it goes even further to say that not all women should raise children. Somel explains to Van that the mother that bears the child is not the one that educates the child. So, it is empowering that motherhood is communal in Herland, however it does perpetual the idea that not all women “should” be mothers. When Van learns of the separation of mother and child in Herland he questions their perfection.

Somel also explains to Van that they are so healthy and fit because the women that can and should have children are the ones that are genetically perfect. Somel says that they have had to discourage women with ill-wanted traits to have children. This concept of genetic perfection is a very Darwinistic ideology. It goes even farther due to the fact that Gilman states that the women of Herland are Aryan.

Lastly, the women of Herland are all virgins. The idea of a land of women, for example the Amazons, is fetishized by men. Terry, in the beginning, practically drools at the thought. The fetishization of virgins is also a prominent theme throughout literature. In an odd way, Gilman has removed sex and sexualization from Herland in presenting women as more than objects of sex, yet in doing so she has sexualized them. It is a paradox. Since all the women of Herland are able to have virgin births, this is a direct connection to Mary as well. Mary is the perfect mother, but she is the virgin mother. This level of perfection is impossible for any women to reach. The women in Herland are described as powerful, intelligent, virtuous, and perfect, however this level of perfect is unattainable by “our women,” as the three men put it throughout the novel.