All that is not silence is the voice of man.

In "Woman's Secret," Elizabeth Robins seems to present a fair account of the Victorian woman's struggle to assert her voice. I think by considering the roots of the patriarchal tradition, Robins tries to understand the perspective of men; at least, she seems to attempt to empathize with the socialization that Victorian men were left to deal with. In essence she sets up her essay in a way that it can revolve around culture rather than gender: "we begin to inquire into the origin of the order under which we live."

However, when I read that men and women alike are equally "victims of circumstance," I begin to wonder about Robins' writing style. I would guess Robins is trying to create an even playing field so that Victorian men are not dumbfounded in a defesive haze or made to feel as though they are being objectified, and that her rhetorical approach is excellent for the era. Even if Robins doesn't believe everything she writes in "Woman's Secret," she certainly knows her audience and knows how to rally support for such a major shift in sensibility by drawing on anthropological/historical (male sphere) and emotional/empathetic (female sphere) arguments.

For me, "Woman's Secret" reaches beyond a treatise for equality between the sexes. When Robins writes about writing style comparing the content of autobiographical versus imaginative prose, she hits on contemporary issues of narrative. This is not to say by any stretch that equality of gender is not an issue in the twenty-first century, it is to instead intended to express that Robins knew that the "Woman's Secret," and by implication man's "reflections," will be ever-present.

However, Robins seems to be asking too much for the patience of men in allowing for women to catch up in "his game," and not enough for women, as individuals, to establish themselves in their own method. This is, I suppose, because of a fear Victorian men would denounce "the other half" as unsubstantiated and incongruous with mainstream discursive patterns. If it doesn't fit, it must be wrong...right?