One complication for present-day students in interpreting Ban Zhao's Lessons for
Women -- and thus, a complication in thinking about women's roles in ancient China
-- is that:
Oshe blamed women for domestic violence even though most such violence was
the fault of husbands
Oshe seemed to instruct her readers that women should be concerned solely with
household affairs even though she also wrote books on Chinese history and
politics
she told her readers to write out copies of her book even though she herself was
illiterate
she wrote in an arrogant style, playing up her own accomplishments, even
though Confucius had urged Chinese to be humble