Rosa Montero

“This work is the exact opposite of a hagiographic catalogue of perfect women. I never wished to do such a thing. Not only do I not believe that women should necessarily be admirable, but I also defend our right to be bad, just as foolish and arbitrary as men can be on occasion. I aspire to the true freedom of being, to accepting our full humanity, with all its lights and shadows. The biographies in this collection therefore include perverse and terrible ladies, such as Laura Riding and the deadly Aurora Rodríguez, mother of poor Hildegart. There are pathetic and deranged woman who can’t be role models for anyone, such as Camille Claudel and Isabelle Eberhardt. And there are others, complex and ambiguous, with admirable achievements and horrendous details, such as the great Simone de Beauvoir, a monumental thinker who also hid certain miseries. And all of them, bad or good, unhappy or happy, defeated or triumphant, are very uncommon people with fascinating lives. By the way, we’ve added one more biography to this edition, that of Empress Irene of Constantinople, another frightful woman, uncommonly powerful and evil.” Rosa Montero