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Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz

by karla from tampico

Sor Juana's Legacy
SOR JUANA <br>(http://dgtve.sep.<br>gob.mx/tve/<br>eduaula/historico/)
SOR JUANA
(http://dgtve.sep.
gob.mx/tve/
eduaula/historico/)

Heroes are people who fight for other people’s rights without knowing they might be rejected, captured, and even killed. They have an amazing idea of what they want to accomplish, without carrying the envy and hate from others. Having the inner strength for doing what they have done is something to admire. Overcoming obstacles is their way to triumph and victory. One of these heroes is Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz.

She defended the right to knowledge for everyone, especially for women. She broke the silence kept for many years within them. Such was the life of this religious woman of 17th-century 'New Spain,' who not only left her mark on Spanish-American literature but whose cry of revolt over the inferior position of women is relevant even today. That is what a hero is all about.

In a small town near to Mexico City in 1648 a hero was born, by the name of Juana Ramirez de Asbaje. Daughter of a hard working woman with six children and of a father she never knew, she was excited to learn all she could about life, languages, and world history. She learned to read before she was three, she even learned Latin by herself in 20 lessons. She was inspired by her grandfather, who was like a father to her.

As an adolescent, she was drawn into religious vocation, and she explained: "Given my complete aversion to marriage, this was the most seemly and decent choice I could make, for the security I wished and my salvation...wanting to live alone, not wanting to have an obligatory occupation that would hamper my study, or doings in the community that would intrude upon the quiet calm of my books."

At the age of 16 she entered a Carmelite convent, but nothing significant happened there for her, so later she joined the Convent of the Sisters of Saint Hieronymus in which she became an archivist, a treasurer, and secretary and fulfilled a number of other tasks. She was everything she wanted to be when she was only a child.

(google.com)
(google.com)

From an early age, Sister Juana had shown great skill at writing poetry. Her poems, sonnets, epigrams, and plays are famous in Latin America. Sor Juana’s knowledge and intelligence was known everywhere, she became known between royal people. Unfortunately, being a woman and a nun at the same time was hard to her, she became a victim of many attacks from clerics. A former friend, the bishop of Puebla, incited Sister Juana to criticize a sermon by a Juiest priest. That gave rise to her famous Carta Athenagorica, in which she fell into his trap. Still, she was able to move on and she answered: “Not to have written much about matters sacred has not been due to lack of faith," she wrote, "but to great fear and the reverence that is due those sacred writings." She wrote with great pain that her church superiors "have gone so far as to prohibit me from studying." She obeyed, but in her own way. She did not study from books but from "all the things that God created," since there is nothing "that does not focus the mind if it is considered in the proper way."

Sor Juana was an amazing human being who didn’t care about what other people thought about her, and she was sure about the things she wrote. Critics were not a problem to her. Finally, a victim of the pressure of the church and the political crisis in Mexico in 1692, she, unfortunately, left her intellectual pursuits. When Mexico suffered from the plague, she let herself die from a disease in 1695.

Today, many of her masterpieces are known all over the world. She was an inspiration for many women at that time, and today she is still one of the representatives of Latin woman, especially for Mexicans. It doesn’t matter how many years have passed, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz will remain in our hearts, as a poet, as a writer, and as an amazing woman who really fought for women’s knowledge and freedom. It’s amazing how we only recognize so many of our heroes after their death, and all the while their thoughts and feelings have stayed in the air.

Page created on 2/8/2005 12:00:00 AM

Last edited 2/8/2005 12:00:00 AM

The beliefs, viewpoints and opinions expressed in this hero submission on the website are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the beliefs, viewpoints and opinions of The MY HERO Project and its staff.