Book description
Sharp-witted and sharp-tongued, Arcangela Tarabotti (1604-52) yearned to be formally educated and enjoy an independent life in Venetian literary circles. But instead, at sixteen, her father forced her into a Benedictine convent. To protest her confinement, Tarabotti composed polemical works exposing the many injustices perpetrated against women of her day.
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Why read it?
1 author picked Paternal Tyranny as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
Sometimes reading eighteenth-century writing can be tedious due to the differing norms and expectations of writing. But Archangela Tarabotti’s essays burn the page.
Her anger is incandescent. She became a cloistered nun without a calling and lived her years trying to make a life of letters. Though she had a couple patrons—men—who brought her books and helped publish her works, she was at their mercy and was later nearly silenced by them. She rails against fathers, priests, and powerful nobles who limit women’s choices and voices. I have never forgotten her anger at injustice.
From Kathleen's list on undaunted Italian women to inspire you.
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