Emmalie Wells-Chandler

Brother Williams

ENG 334

11 December 2020

Ligeia and the Cult of True Womanhood

Lady Ligeia and her story have captivated readers of Edgar Allen Poe for almost 200

years. She is one of the most interesting and stereotype-destroying female characters of that time.

There have been many definitions of a woman in literature. Authors, especially male authors,

seem to want to change the meaning of a “true” woman every few decades. Around Edgar Allan

Poe’s time, there was what is now known as “the Cult of True Womanhood.” This “cult” said

that a true woman must be pious, meaning a Protestant churchgoer, pure, meaning sexually

pure(a virgin before marriage and completely faithful to her spouse following marriage),

domestic, meaning a stay-at-home wife, and submissive. Submissive meaning submissive to the

man of the house, including submissive sexually, and submissive to God. Any woman outside of

even one of these bounds was considered a disgrace and not a true woman. In Edgar Allan Poe’s

story Ligeia, Poe shows his disdain of the Cult of True Womanhood’s requirements by proving

that the character of Ligeia is not a true woman through her appearance and ethereal,

otherworldly characteristics.

The original definition of the Cult of True Womanhood comes from an essay by Barbara

Welter written in 1966. She wrote:

The attributes of True Womanhood, by which a woman judged herself and was judged by

her husband, her neighbors, and society could be divided into four cardinal virtues-piety,
 purity, submissiveness, and domesticity. Put them all together and they spelled mother,

daughter, sister, wife-woman. Without them, no matter whether there was fame,

achievement, or wealth, all was ashes. With them, she was promised happiness and

power.

This essay gave scholars a word or definition to what they already knew about 19th-century

womanhood. In 2002, Rebecca Bravard revisited Welter’s essay in an essay titled “Cult of True

Womanhood.” She quotes Welter, as well as stating herself: “Women were expected to adhere to

the four cardinal virtues of True Womanhood: purity, piety, domesticity, and submission.” No

woman was allowed outside these bounds without judgment and shunning from “true women.”

Mary Kelley, in her essay “Beyond the Boundaries,” stated that “In the closely affiliated fields of

American women's history and American women's literature, many scholars, at least until

recently, have agreed that antebellum women were held hostage to the four behavioral tenets that

Welter posited-‘piety, purity, submissiveness and domesticity.’” She describes women as being

“held hostage,” which while true, gives readers quite the gruesome view of 19th-century

womanhood. Welter also comments on the double standards of what was expected by men and

women. “ Submission was perhaps the most feminine virtue expected of women. Men were

supposed to be religious, although they rarely had time for it, and supposed to be pure, although

it came awfully hard to them, men were the movers, the doers, the actors. Women were the

passive, sub- missive responders.” As proved by Edgar Allen Poe and other authors, not

everyone agreed with the cult for their characters, and many often wrote about the “outlier.”

Firstly, Poe’s Ligeia is not a typical or true woman by appearance. Poe says on page 680,

speaking of Ligeia, “Yet her features were not of that regular mould which we have been falsely

taught to worship in the classical labors of the Heathen.” Everyone knows the blonde hair,
blue-eyed beauty standard of today and yesteryear. Back then, even brown hair was considered

sufficient for a “true” woman. However, Ligeia is described on page 680 as having

“raven-black...naturally-curling tresses.” Her hair was black and naturally curly. Black hair could

not be further from the pure blonde hair true women were “supposed” to have. Additionally, the

color black is often associated with fear, death, evil, and even aggression. Those who subscribe

to the Cult of the True Woman might claim that Ligeia’s black hair may be a symbol of the devil

in her very countenance. Poe knows this, of course, and uses her hair color to push the idea that

Ligeia is not a true woman.

To make matters worse in that respect, Ligeia also has black eyes. Poe, or his unnamed

narrator, describes her eyes on page 681 as being “the most beautiful black.” Black eyes are

extremely rare, as it does not exist. Yet in a lot of literature, people who are described to have

black eyes do not fit in any description of a “good guy” or someone who would fit in the

stereotypical mold. For example, Snape in Harry Potter is described to have black eyes, and he is

one of the main antagonists. Even Hagrid, the other main character who is described to have

black eyes, is not a good guy in the same way James Potter would be considered. Hagrid is a

good character and a good friend of Harry’s, but would not fit into a stereotypical mold. In

regards to Ligeia, the black eyes are an easy signifier of not fitting into the “true” woman mold.

Marita Nadal, in her essay “Trauma and the Uncanny in Edgar Allan Poe's ‘Ligeia’ and

‘The Fall of the House of Usher.’” says “Thus Ligeia’s frightening eyes and their final

unreadability suggest the ghostliness and terror of the uncanny—they are familiar and strange,

homely and “wild” (657, 666)—and the enigmatic core of trauma, the locus of referentiality that

remains inaccessible (it cannot be located in a specific place or time) and eludes representation.”

Ligeia’s eyes set her so far off of the norm for both men and women, it proves Poe’s careful
rejection of the True Womanhood cult ideas. Elisabete Lopes, in her essay “Unburying the Wife:

A Reflection Upon the Female Uncanny in Poe's ‘Ligeia,’ also says “These eyes that seem to

contain the wisdom of "unusual aged people" (97) constitute indeed the uncanny body part that

triggers the suspicion that Ligeia stands for more than what it is shown.” Many scholars agree

with Lopes here, claiming that Ligeia is not only not a true woman, but may not be a woman at

all.

In an essay by Jack and June Davis, they say that “The story proliferates with hints that

Ligeia is only a figment of the narrator's imagination (which no doubt explains why those who

persist in interpreting "Ligeia" as a real character find it so difficult to give convincing logic and

unity to their analyses)(171).” Lopes, as well as proving this point that Ligeia is not a true

woman, is making the claim that Ligeia is an ethereal, ghostlike character. Poe writes several

descriptive phrases that make Ligeia seem ethereal, which only adds to pushing her away from

society’s standards. For example, the narrator cannot even remember ever meeting Ligeia; he just

suddenly knew her. The opening sentence of the story says “I cannot, for my soul, remember

how, when, or even precisely where I first became acquainted with the lady Ligeia(679).” Ligeia

seems to just float into his life like a spirit or an otherworldly creature. This is of course also

supported by the fact that she then returns from the dead at the end of the story. Very few “true”

women accomplish reincarnation. The impossibility of Ligeia not only returning from the dead

but metamorphosing from Lady Rowena’s dying body after supposedly poisoning her only adds

the ethereal, otherworldly aspect of Ligeia’s character.

Poe does not only make this distinction away from true women about Ligeia; many of his

other female characters have some of the same anomalies. Aspasia Stephanou makes the claim

that Poe’s women, including Ligeia, are in fact vampiric characters. Stephanou says
 Madeline Usher, Berenice, Morella, and Ligeia represent the dark ladies of Romantic

passion, with black hair and dark eyes, whose mysterious deaths are bloodless and their

bodies emptied of the blood that constitutes their identity. Poe’s consuming women are

especially unique in the way they all die by unknown consuming diseases.

Poe is determined in so many of his stories to completely destroy this stereotypical woman that

he often goes to extremes, which is very typical of the man who wrote “The Raven.”

Ligeia is also described as having a “very” low voice, which is very uncharacteristic for a

woman. Women, especially in this “true” woman stereotype. Women are meant to have these

higher, daintier, “weaker” voices, while men have the lower and “stronger” voices. But Poe was

not satisfied with her black hair and eyes and threw Ligeia even further from the requirements of

a true woman by giving her this deep, full voice that entrances the narrator.

But was Poe satisfied even then? Of course not, it’s Edgar Allen Poe. He wanted to say

the biggest “forget you guys” to the requirements of the Cult and gave Ligeia an even more

scandalous thing than black hair or eyes: an education. Everyone knows scholarly education was

all but banned for women back then. Women needed to know how to run a household, play

Mozart and stitch a pillowcase before drawing a few flowers. They had no need for things such

as literature, math, science, or anything truly interesting. This was done in an attempt to abandon

any woman who dared remain unmarried, unattached, and in need/want of a career. In her essay

“American Womanhood and The New Woman: A Rhetorical Consideration of the Development

and Circulation of Female Stereotypes, 1890-1920,” RL Stroup says “Though elite and

middle-class women were educated, the areas in which they were educated did not lend

themselves to careers in the outside world. Rather, marriage and motherhood were the defining
staples of women’s lives.” Women were not to want a career or anything outside of the home, so

they were purposefully deprived of an education so they had no other options.

They received what little schooling needed to run the household and that was it. Women

were preferred to have a less academic education, one reason being so that men could feel

superior. Yet another reason is academic education for the nobility meant time away from their

“accomplishment” education (playing instruments, painting, embroidery, etc), and for the

working class, it was time away from helping their mother with household chores. However,

Poe’s narrator describes Ligeia as having an “immense” education, “such as I have never known

in a woman.” The narrator then describes how Ligeia is well-traveled and knows many

languages, another anomaly for women. Ligeia clearly didn’t spend all her childhood and

teenage years in the house like the “true” woman cult insists on. She is well educated and

traveled, going directly against the “domestic” requirement.

Did our friend Edgar Allen Poe stop there? Oh no, he is not done. Poe’s narrator also

describes Ligeia as superior to him. In the exact words, he says “Without Ligeia I was but a child

groping benighted. Her presence, her readings alone, rendered vividly luminous the many

mysteries of the transcendentalism in which we were immersed.” In this culture of a “true”

woman needing to be the submissive one, yet by a man’s omission Ligeia is superior to him, and

by definition, not a true woman. In the essay mentioned above, Welter also describes the

submissiveness of a woman. “Submission was perhaps the most feminine virtue expected of

women. Men were supposed to be religious, although they rarely had time for it, and supposed

to be pure, although it came awfully hard to them, men were the movers, the doers, the actors.

Women were the passive, sub- missive responders.” Women were not even supposed to have

opinions. But according to the narrator, Ligeia also had a will stronger than any other.
 The cult of True Womanhood has some very specific requirements. A woman by those

terms must be submissive, domestic, pure, and pious. As mentioned above, even those

requirements have specifications. Very few women in literature actually fit this mold, but Ligeia

seems to be as far from the requirements as any. As a strong-willed, highly educated woman with

raven black hair and eyes, Ligeia falls far from the tree of “true” women as can be. Her ethereal

presence and the theory that she is a figment of the narrator's imagination further prove her

removal from a stereotypical woman. Edgar Allan Poe proves his disdain of the cult of True

Womanhood and writes Ligeia as an outlier through descriptions of Ligeia and her

characteristics.
 Works Cited

1. Davis, Jack L., and June H. Davis. “Poe's Ethereal Ligeia.” The Bulletin of the Rocky

Mountain Modern Language Association, vol. 24, no. 4, 1970, pp. 170–176. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/1346725. Accessed 14 Dec. 2020.

2. Kelley, Mary. “Beyond the Boundaries.” Journal of the Early Republic, vol. 21, no. 1,

2001, pp. 73–78. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3125096. Accessed 4 Dec. 2020.

3. Lopes, Elisabete. “Unburying the Wife: A Reflection Upon the Female Uncanny in Poe's

‘Ligeia.’” The Edgar Allan Poe Review, vol. 11, no. 1, 2010, pp. 40–50. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/41506388. Accessed 4 Dec. 2020.

4. Nadal, Marita. “Trauma and the Uncanny in Edgar Allan Poe's ‘Ligeia’ and ‘The Fall of

the House of Usher.’” The Edgar Allan Poe Review, vol. 17, no. 2, 2016, pp. 178–192.

JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/10.5325/edgallpoerev.17.2.0178. Accessed 4 Dec. 2020.

5. Saulsbury Bravard, Rebecca. "Cult of True Womanhood". The Literary Encyclopedia.

First published 30 June 2002

[https://www-litencyc-com.byui.idm.oclc.org/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=242,

accessed 04 December 2020 .]

6. Stephanou, Aspasia. “Lovely Apparitions and Spiritualized Corpses: Consumption,

Medical Discourse, and Edgar Allan Poe's Female Vampire.” The Edgar Allan Poe

Review, vol. 14, no. 1, 2013, pp. 36–54. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/10.5325/edgallpoerev.14.1.0036. Accessed 14 Dec. 2020.

7. Stroup, R. L. “American Womanhood and The New Woman: A Rhetorical Consideration

of the Development and Circulation of Female Stereotypes, 1890-1920”. Young Scholars

https://youngscholarsinwriting.org/index.php/ysiw/article/view/272.

8. Welter, Barbara. “The Cult of True Womanhood: 1820-1860.” American Quarterly, vol.

18, no. 2, 1966, pp. 151–174. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2711179 . Accessed 4 Dec.

2020.