Connect with us

Opinion

IWD 2021: WTF… Wonder Woman was Manx?!

Published

5 years ago

on

Now it’s easy to see that we have some pretty incredible women on the Isle of Man (I mean, we all think our mum is our very own Wonder Woman, right?), however what if I told you that the real-life inspo for the actual Wonder Woman comic books was born on the Island? Now I think that’s pretty cool.
Elizabeth Holloway Marston was born on the Isle of Man in 1893, and although she was raised in Boston Massachusetts, I like to think of her as a Manxie. Elizabeth was an incredibly intelligent and talented woman, who obtained degrees in both psychology and law in 1915 and 1918 respectively, I think this is bloody impressive considering that at that time; women didn’t even have the right to vote in the US.Elizabeth and her husband William Moulton Marston were both psychologists, and impressively, invented the modern lie detector test. They led a polyamorous lifestyle (risqué hey) with another woman, Olive Byrne, who had initially interviewed William in 1940 about his love of comic books.This interview led to William being hired as an educational consultant for two companies, which would later merge to become DC Comics, and before too long William (with the help of Elizabeth, of course) concocted the idea of a new type of superhero, one which embodied,

“All the strength of Superman plus all the allure of a good and beautiful woman”

Enter Wonder Woman, arguably the most popular female comic book superhero of all time, and rightfully so. As William stated himself, “Wonder Woman is psychological propaganda for the new type of woman who, I believe, should rule the world” – can I get an Amen?Wonder Woman was a fighter for equality and has been viewed throughout the years as an icon for feminism and female empowerment, and was very much based upon Elizabeth as a strong, intelligent woman, who “embodied the feminism of the day”. We shouldn’t be surprised that a woman who was born on the Isle of Man was the inspiration behind such a strong female character. We live on an extraordinary island filled with extraordinary women (and not forgetting the incredible men) who continue to fight for positive change and equality. These people are making history, we should all have a think about the people that came before us who inspired such positive changes, and also the Wonder Women (and Wonder Men) on our Island today.

var bannersnack_embed = {“hash”:”b7psde4aj”,”width”:728,”height”:90,”t”:1615057800,”userId”:43338046,”responsive”:true,”type”:”html5″};

//cdn.bannersnack.com/iframe/embed.js

Related Topics:
Continue Reading