Maria Trubnikova
Black and white portrait of a seated woman in formal 19th-century clothing, looking to the left of the frame
Born1835 (1835)
Died1897 (aged 61–62)
NationalityRussian
OccupationActivist
MovementFeminism in Russia
SpouseKonstantin Trubnikov (married 1854–1876)
Children7

Maria Vasilievna Trubnikova (Russian: Мари́я Васи́льевна Тру́бникова, née Ivasheva [Ивашева]; 1835 – 1897) was a Russian feminist and activist.

Of mixed Russian and French heritage, Trubnikova was orphaned at an early age, and subsequently raised by a wealthy relative. At 19, she married; she and her husband, Konstantin, had seven children. In adulthood, Trubnikova hosted a women-only salon which became a center of feminist activism.

Alongside Anna Filosofova and Nadezhda Stasova, whom she mentored, she was a leader of the first organised Russian women's movement. Together, the three were referred to as the "triumvirate".[1][2] They founded and led a number of organizations designed to promote women's cultural and economic independence, including a publishing cooperative. The triumvirate also pushed the government to allow women to access higher education, achieving some success in this area. In later life, Trubnikova experienced personal illness and difficulties, and died in 1897.

Early life

Trubnikova's mother and father

Ivasheva was born in 1835.[3] Her father, Vasily Ivashev, had been a participant in the Decembrist revolt ten years earlier, and consequently been sent to a Siberian exile.[1] Ivasheva's mother, Camille LeDentu (alternately "LeDantieux"), was of French descent. Ivasheva grew up alongside three siblings. Both her parents passed away when she was very young (in 1839 and 1840); her mother died in childbirth.[1][3]

Subsequently, Ivasheva was raised by a wealthier aunt, the Princess Khovanskaia, and received an education.[1] At age 19, she married Konstantin Trubnikov, a wealthy landowner of liberal sympathies, and took his name (in feminine form, Trubnikova).[1][3] She and Trubnikov had seven children (including Olga)—although only four, all daughters, survived to adulthood.[1] Trubnikov later became a stock trader.[3]

Career

Trubnikova was influenced by the writings of French writers such as Jules Michelet and Henri de Saint-Simon.[1] A strong personality, Trubnikova mentored other women interested in feminism, and both of her longtime colleagues, Filosofova and Stasova, wrote that they had been "empty-headed" before they met her.[3] She hosted a salon that included a large group of wealthy women concerned with the economic and educational status of women in Russia.[3] Trubnikova's woman-only salon was an offshoot of a larger mixed-gender salon; the scholar Rochelle Ruthchild writes that women who hosted these mixed-gender salons were "often idealized as muses inspiring male creativity." Trubnikova, however, actively sought to educate fellow women on feminist issues, seeing her new salon as a "venue for empowering" them.[3] She used any opportunity to recruit women to her cause; for instance, during a routine medical appointment, she convinced her doctor to send his wife to the salon.[3] Trubnikova and the other members of the "triumvirate" were not radical in style or fashion, and retained their status in the upper class.[3][4]

In 1859, Trubnikova (along with Stasova, Filosofova, and others) founded the Society for Cheap Lodgings and Other Benefits for the Citizens of St. Petersburg.[1][3] The group had two factions, the "German party" and the "Russian party", which differed on their preferred approach.[2] The "Germans" favored a traditional, supervised philanthropy to institutions and supervision of the poor. The "Russians" focused on self-help and direct aid, attempting to avoid patronization and maintain the privacy of those aided.[2][3] In early 1861, the organization split in two, with the "triumvirate" leading the "Russians".[2] The reduced group's charter was approved in February 1861, with Trubnikova as its first president.[2][3] The organization provided housing and work as seamstresses to its female clients (primarily widows and wives whose husbands had abandoned them).[2] It included a day care and a communal kitchen.[2]

 In 1863, Stasova, Trubnikova and Anna Engelhardt founded the first Russian Women's Publishing Cooperative.[5] Employing upwards of thirty women, the cooperative focused on writing and translation; it published a wide variety of books, including textbooks, scientific works and children's stories.[6] The cooperative lasted until 1879.[3] Later in the 1860s, Trubnikova traveled to England to meet Josephine Butler, and established a correspondence with John Stuart Mill and Jenny d'Héricourt.[1] Mill became a supporter of her efforts in Russia.[1]

Trubnikova and Stasova also began pushing, in 1867, for Russian universities to create courses for women.[1] Demonstrating "considerable skill in rallying popular support", according to the historian Christine Johansen, the women wrote a carefully-worded petition to Tsar Alexander II. They gathered over 400 signatures among middle and upper-class women.[4] However, there was widespread opposition to the education of women, including by the relevant minister, Dmitry Tolstoy.[5] Tolstoy argued that women would abandon education after being married, and dismissed the signatories by stating that they were "sheep" merely following the latest fashion. He rejected the petition in late 1868, but allowed mixed-gender public lectures which women could attend.[4] However, these were rapidly taken up, overwhelmingly by women. The "triumvirate" also appealed to war minister Dmitry Milyutin, who agreed to host the courses after being persuaded by his wife, daughter, and Filosofova. Tolstoy countered by allowing the lectures at his own apartments, where he could monitor them.[4] The political movement in favor of women's education continued to grow, and by October 1869, the Russian government permitted a limited set of courses for women on advanced subjects.[1][5][4] The courses began in January 1870.[5] They became known as the Vladimirskii courses, after their host beginning in 1872, the Vladimir college.[5]

Later career

In 1869, Trubnikova left Russia temporarily to seek treatment for mental illness.[1][3] By this time, her husband had grown less liberal, becoming actively opposed to her work.[3] He had also lost much of her inheritance from her aunt in the stock market.[3] Upon her return in 1876, Trubnikova and her husband separated, and she struggled with money. Her daughters, who were radical activists, began to support her, and she also worked as a writer. [3] Trubnikova hosted meetings of illegal societies at her house, and once helped hide the revolutionary Sophia Perovskaya.[3] By 1878, her illness resulted in her becoming much less active, although she did work for the release of two of her daughters following their arrest in 1881.[1] In 1895, Trubnikova, Stasova, and Filosofova founded the Russian Women's Mutual Philanthropic Society (RWMPS).[1] She died in 1897.[1]

General references

  • Arsenyev, Konstantin Konstantinovich, ed. (1907). "Стасова, Надежда Васильевна" [Stasova, Nadezhda Vasilievna]. Энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона [Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary]. St. Petersburg.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

Citations

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Rappaport, Helen (2001). Encyclopedia of women social reformers. Vol. 2. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO. pp. 715–716. ISBN 978-1-57607-101-4.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Engel, Barbara Alpern (2000). "Searching for a politics of personal life". Mothers and daughters: women of the intelligentsia in nineteenth-century Russia. Studies in Russian literature and theory. Evanston, Ill: Northwestern University Press. ISBN 978-0-8101-1740-2.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Ruthchild, Rochelle G. (2009). "Reframing public and private space in mid-nineteenth century Russia : the triumvirate of Anna Filosofova, Nadezhda Stasova, and Mariia Trubnikova". In Worobec, Christine D. (ed.). The human tradition in imperial Russia. The human tradition around the world. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-7425-3737-8.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 Johanson, Christine (1987). "Chapter II: The Politics of Minimal Concessions - Women's Courses in Moscow and St. Petersburg". Women's struggle for higher education in Russia: 1855 - 1900. Kingston, Canada: McGill University Press. ISBN 978-0-7735-0565-0.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Muravyeva, Marianna (2006). de Haan, Francisca; Daskalova, Krassimira; Loutfi, Anna (eds.). A Biographical Dictionary of Women's Movements and Feminisms: Central, Eastern, and South Eastern Europe, 19th and 20th Centuries. Central European University Press. pp. 526–9. ISBN 9786155053726.
  6. ↑ Kaufman, Andrew D. (2022). The Gambler Wife: A True Story of Love, Risk, and the Woman Who Saved Dostoyevsky. Penguin Books. p. 209. ISBN 9780525537151.
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