Year: 2014
Type: article
Abstract: Convents in the early modern period were, as is widely known, a privileged space for women’s writing especially with regard to epistolary activity. Taking into consideration the main features of this written production and the nuns’ writing culture, this essay compares the letters of Teresa de Jesús (Teresa of Ávila) to the correspondence of Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda with King Philip IV. This analysis reveals deeply seated epistolary patterns. On the one hand, the Ávila letters show the daily role played by written communication in the Carmelite reform and the importance of writing for the relationships between nuns within the order. On the other hand, Ágreda’s correspondence with the king is much closer to the profile of the “divine mother”, a profile emphasizing the moral authority played by the nuns, whose spiritual advice was often demanded by kings and other members of the elite.
Source: Cuadernos de Historia Moderna
Author: Antonio Castillo-Gómez
Institution: Universidad de Alcalá
Language: Spanish
Topic: Early Modern Women Writers
Subfield: Religious studies
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W1996682289