ABSTRACT

Early modern Spanish women's narrative has coalesced into a distinct field of critical inquiry in the twenty-first century thanks to three developments. First, "gynocriticism" increased awareness that Spain's "herstory" remained to be uncovered and told. Second, the history of the novel in Spain expanded its scope to embrace popular genres that had been either denigrated or overlooked, such as the chivalric romance and the courtly novel. Third, New Historicism, by admitting fiction into the ranks of allowable historical documentation, created the possibility of reading women's cultural history through the optic of women's literary production. Five female authors of secular prose fiction have emerged from the first wave of scholarship: Beatriz Bernal, Maria de Zayas y Sotomayor, Leonor de Meneses, who wrote under the pseudonym of Laura Mauricia, Mariana de Carvajal y Saavedra, and Ana Francisca Abarca de Bolea. The second pair of recovered women's narratives was written by Maria de Zayas y Sotomayor.