The
story of Anna Filosofva, Maria Trubnikova, and Nadezhda Stasova is the
story of three women who used their power, money, and privilege to
fight for women to be granted admittance to Russia's
universities. Against the backdrop of revolution, these three women
battled discrimination and bureaucracy to improve the quality
of
life for all women in Russia and paved the way for the rest of the
world to follow suit.
The
rise to power of Tsar Alexander the Second in 1855, ushered in a new
era of social and political change in Russia. Revolution was in the
air among the lower classes, and every day there was more and more
reason to hope that the new, progressive leader would revolutionise
Russia’s social and political systems. There was excitement
that Marxist, anarchist, and Populist movements would provide the
economic reform needed to bring people out of poverty. Among this
revolutionary spirit, three babies were born who would their power,
wealth, and status to reshape the way world thinks about the power of
educating women, forever.
Our
story begins with Anna
Filosofva. Born Anna Dyagileva on August 5th,
1837 in Perm, Filosofva began her life as a home-schooled girl from
the very wealthy Dyagileva family. Growing up, playing in the halls
of her glamorous apartments paid for by her fabulously rich
ancestors, Filosofva was not forced to consider the harsh realities
of poverty until she married Dmitryevich Filosofov, a powerful
official in the Ministry of War and Defence who came from a very
rich, serf-owning family. It was while living with her husband and
his family that Filosofva began to reflect on social issues affecting
the lower classes. Christine D. Worobec’s book ‘The Human
Tradition in Imperial Russia’ describes Dmitryevich’s
father as “a tyrannical figure” and noted that the cruel
ways in which her father-in-law would exploit the peasants living on
his estate for financial gain.
It
was childhood friend Maria
Trubnikova however who inspired Filosofva to turn her
reflections
on social and economic issues affecting the poor, into action. Maria
Trubnikova was of an even higher social class than Filosofva, being a
blood relative of Princess Ekaterina Khovanskaia, her aunt who took
Trubnikova in after the death of her mother. Trubnikova’s aunt
gave her an education more sophisticated than most aristocratic men
would have received at the time, becoming educated on many issues,
particularly the social and economic difficulties faced by women.
After her marriage to Konstantin Trubnikova at age 19, she began to
edit for his left-wing magazine and become even more knowledgeable
about the inequalities present in modern Russian society.
And
it was in the wooden libraries of Trubnikova’s home, between
the shelves stacked with feminist literature, and in the rare moments
when the seven Trubnikova children were quiet, that the seeds of
revolution were sown. Trubnikova began to educate Filosofva on the
feminist movements in England and the two of them began to discuss
the ways they could respond to the issues they saw in society.
Filosofva described Trubnikova as “an
angel, gentle and patient. She developed me, read with me. This was
hard, since I didn't know anything.” And so in 1860, the
two of them hatched the plans for the "Society for Cheap Lodging
and Other Aid to the Residents of Saint Petersburg"
While
the "Society
for Cheap
Lodging and Other Aid to the Residents of Saint Petersburg"
may not have had the catchiest name, it did have the simple goal of
providing cheap and stable accommodation to women living in poverty.
In establishing and financing the hostels, Filosofva and Trubnikova
recruited the help of Nadezhda
Stasova, another woman from a wealthy upbringing, determined
to
rectify a number of social and economic issues in Russia.
Stasova
had a very carefree youth, being educated at home until she was 16.
At age 16, however, her family pressured her into marriage, arranging
a marriage to a much older Russian general for her. But on the day of
her wedding, as Stasova was standing covered head to toe in white
lace preparing to walk down the aisle, her fiancé declared
that he could not marry Stasova as he had fallen in love with a much
younger woman. Completely humiliated and struggling with the lack of
control Stasova had over her own decisions, she vowed to never marry
again. Her wedding fiasco inspired a deep panic within Stasova, as
she began to question her purpose in life and went in search of a
career which would provide her with some sense of fulfilment and
control over her life. Stasova began her quest by caring for her
disabled sister, Sofia who was unable to walk and suffered from an
intellectual disability. In caring for Sofia, Stasova developed a
deep empathy for the plights of marginalised people. Upon the death
of her sister in 1858, Stasova met Trubnikova and joined her and
Filosofva to help them reach the goals of the society.
And
the goals of both the society and the Triumvirate – as Anna,
Maria, and Stasova would be known by 1863 – started simply.
They aimed to provide cost housing to women who would otherwise find
themselves homeless. However, amongst the overcrowded hostels
bursting at the seams with widows, abandoned mothers, and lower-class
women the Triumvirate recognised that it was the limited access women
had to training that was stopping women from finding stable
employment and earning an income with which to live off. This
recognition led the society to expand its services; beginning to
provide training in the use of sewing machines and other textile
industry machines, in an attempt to make their patrons more
employable and hopefully lift some women out of poverty.
Despite
this training, the society did not see enough of an increase in
employment to make a considerable dent in the poverty of the women.
In an attempt to rectify this and expand the number of employment
opportunities present for lower-class women, the Triumvirate opened a
publishing company called the ‘Women’s
Publishing Artel’ which employed women as writers,
translators, editors, and type setters. The Artel provided women with
stable employment and aimed to preserve workers rights by creating
clean and safe working environments which paid women fairly for their
labour.
However,
despite working closely with women to boost their skills and find
stable employment, women were not being employed at a particularly
high rate. The Triumvirate realised that it was their own educations
which inspired them to embark on their political work and gave them
the knowledge they needed to work properly. They all received high
quality educations from their very wealthy families, an education
which was developed by their personal experiences later on in life.
Trubnikova received her education in the ways of the word from her
Aunt. Filosofva was taught by Maria, who guided her through an
education in the systemic inequality present in society. And Stasova
learned about the difficulties faced by minority groups through
caring for her disabled sister. Without this education, the
Triumvirate realised that they would not have been able to build
their careers and the same must hold true of all women. The
Triumvirate soon realised the importance of properly educating all
people, and came to understand that the limited access women had to
formal education was what was really keeping them in poverty.
And
thus, the Triumvirate embarked on their most well-known and
influential mission: University
education for women.
In
1867, after the Crimean War when universities began to open their
doors to non-noble men, the Triumvirate began their campaign to grant
women access to tertiary education. Their work began with the
creation of a petition which demanded that the Tzar and his
government grant Filosofva, Trubnikova, and Stasova permission to
open the first higher education courses for women at the Saint
Petersburg State University, which would allow them to earn a formal
qualification. There was strong resistance from conservatives,
including the education minister Dmitry Tolstoy, who believed that
“women were inadequately prepared for university level
instruction.” He ultimately refused the Triumvirate the right
to start their formal university courses. However, he did not
outright dismiss the demands of the petition, and in 1871, Tolstoy
conceded women the right to informally
attend university lectures for free without receiving any formal
qualifications. In the evenings, after the men had all left
and
the Vladimirsky building should have stood darkened and quiet, women
filled the hallways with light and sound – coming from all over
Russia to learn about everything from mathematics, to art history, to
philosophy. These informal classes were named the Vladimirsky
courses, named after the college where the classes were held.
The
reaction to these classes was decidedly negative, with many wealthy
families withdrawing their daughter’s enrolment after receiving
criticism from their rich friends. The courses also received, heavy
backlash from a number of conservative groups and internal pressure
from some government officials. This, coupled with the fact that the
courses did not receive much in the way of government funding, with
most of the money coming directly from Stasova and the library being
run entirely out of her personal apartment, lead to the closure of
the Vladimirsky courses in 1875.
Not
to be defeated however, the Triumvirate regrouped in Trubnikova’s
library and continued to function as an aristocratic pressure group
with the goal of providing women with access to university-level
education. The three of them used their contacts in the Russian
government, and with western feminists like Josephine Butler to
eventually obtain official permission in 1876, to open the first
Russian women’s university, known as the Bestuzhev
courses. Two years later in 1878, after much planning,
research,
and petitioning the Bestuzhev courses officially began, with
qualified professors teaching courses which would lead to formal
degrees and qualifications. These degrees did not come cheap, however
and so the Triumvirate, with Stasova at the helm – still
running the library from her apartment which was proving to be quite
a challenge as women would try to come to her apartments at all hours
of the night to study (students have always been students) –
began a program to raise money to pay for the education of women who
could not afford to pay their own way; continuing their commitment to
equal access to educational opportunities for all people.
While
Triumvirate were enjoying great amounts of professional success, the
same could not be said of their personal lives. The 1860’s,
Trubnikova’s husband began to resent her outside, feminist
work, feeling that it kept Trubnikova from fulfilling her domestic
duties in the home. This resentment led to outright physical and
emotional abuse, with her husband becoming a tyrannical figure in the
household. Her husband began to gamble irresponsibly and over the
course of seven years he gambled away much of Trubnikova’s
personal fortune. The physical abuse, coupled with the toll seven
pregnancies in ten years took on her body, left Trubnikova unable to
walk without the assistance of a cane or wheelchair. In 1869, the
physical and phycological abuse became to much and Maria had a
nervous breakdown which lead to her leaving her husband, taking what
was left of her fortune, and purchasing her own apartments.
Meanwhile,
Russia was experiencing the ramifications of a noticeable change in
the ruling style of Tsar Alexander the Second of Russia. After
left-wing revolutionaries made an attempt to assassinate Alexander II
because they thought his policies did not go far enough to support an
economic revolution, he began to behave in more paranoid and
reactionary ways. The Tsar made a number of appointments to his
cabinet, replacing existing left-wing minsters with more conservative
ones, and shifting university curriculums so they included less
exposure to liberal thought. He also established the position of
‘governor-general.’ Those appointed to the position were
granted the power to prosecute people in military courts and exile
political offenders. This spelt trouble for Triumvirate, as their
political activism and radical sympathy had angered a number of very
powerful government officials.
This
was the beginning of a very tense period in the lives of the
Triumvirate. With Filosofva being sent away (probably to Siberia
although her exact location is unclear) and unable to contact anyone,
the responsibility to continue their political activism fell solely
to Trubnikova and Stasova, who struggled with the devastation of
losing their best friend and fear that she may never be allowed to
return to Russia. This, coupled with the fact that political decent
was, shall we say, heavily discouraged their activism became
increasingly difficult. But, in true Triumvirate fashion, they didn’t
let that stop them. And in Trubnikova’s cosy apartment which
served as a safe haven from her ex-husband, the two of them hosted
illegal candle-light meetings of political activists where
revolutionist thoughts were shared away from the prying ears of the
government. They also hid revolutionary literature in between copies
of Russia’s newest bestselling novels from up and coming
authors like Leo Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov, in a time when critique
of the government would result in persecution. Trubnikova and
Stasova, not content with hosting illegal meetings that would have
had them thrown in jail if they had been caught, also used
governmental contacts and legal knowledge to ensure that many arrests
of revolutionaries were overturned and continued to work on Anna’s
case, desperate to bring her back to them.
After
the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881, Tsar Alexander III
overturned many political prisoners’ convictions and Filosofva
was finally allowed to return home to Russia. Although their union
was a happy occasion for everyone, Trubnikova’s physical
disabilities and mental condition forced her to withdraw from
political and feminist activities. The three women remained close
friends for the rest of their lives, supporting each other through
their many endeavours and regularly meeting in Maria’s
apartments to discuss feminist literature over cups of tea.
Stasova
and Filosofva both continued to work well into their late lives.
Stasova continued in her position as director of the Bestuzhev
courses until she is removed by the Tsar in 1889, despite loud and
very brash protest on Stasova’s part. After her removal she
enjoyed a well-deserved retirement before passing away on September
27, 1895. Trubnikova also passed away two years later on April 28th,
1897, leaving a grief-stricken Filosofva to do what she does best;
carry on.
And
carry on she did. In 1895, Filosofva continued her dedication toward
brightening the economic and social prospects of the lower-classes by
founding the ‘Charity
Association of Russian Women.’ This organisation was a
secret political group disguised as a charity, dedicated to
furthering the rights of newly emancipated serfs, the working class,
and ethnic minorities, who were not paid fairly for their labour,
could not buy or sell their land, were barred from voting, unallowed
to unionise, and banned from many schools. This led to her to
participate in the Russian Revolution in 1905, which was a mass
political and social movement working for the same causes as the
‘Charity Association of Russian Women,’ and was not an
official war like the Russian Revolution of 1917. During this time,
she joined the Constitutional Democratic Party, a newly founded
left-wing political party which supported the Russian Revolution.
Filosofva eventually rose through the ranks of the party and became
chairman of the women’s branch in 1908.
In
1911, Russia celebrated the fiftieth jubilee of Filosofva’s
political and feminist work, and her contributions to the education
and advancement of women and other minority groups in Russia. The
jubilee festivities were attended by more than one hundred women’s
organisations and foreign political groups, who gave speeches and
honoured Filosofva’s contributions to Russia’s political
and education systems. Revolution was in the air among the bustling
crowd, and every day there was more and more reason to hope that the
work three selfless, progressive, and generous women had forever
changed the way women and the lower classes would access education
and training. Among this revolutionary spirit, Anna
Filosofva passed away on March 17th,
1912,
and although she as a public figure has long since been forgotten,
her legacy – and the legacy of Nadezhda Stasova and Maria
Trubnikova live on, three women who used their power, wealth, and
status to reshape the way the world thinks about the power of
educating women, forever.
Grace
Ryan is a young, Australian writer who can often be found hunched
over her laptop, fussing over comma placement and line spacing. Grace
lives with her loving family and her grumpy cat, and she enjoys
playing music in her spare time. Grace is an amateur writer who has
an incredible passion for writing and is excited to share her work
with others.
