Convent Paradise

The radical Venetian writer Arcangela Tarabotti (1604–1652), compelled against her will to become a nun, is well known for her scathing attacks on patriarchal institutions for forcing women into convents. Convent Paradise (1643), Tarabotti’s first published work, instead invites the reader into the cloister to experience not only the trials of enclosure, but also its spiritual joys. In stark contrast to her other works, Convent Paradise aims to celebrate the religious culture that colored every aspect of Tarabotti’s experience as a seventeenth-century Venetian and a nun. At the same time, this nuanced exploration of monastic life conveys a markedly feminist spirituality. Tarabotti’s meditative portrait of the convent enriches our understanding of her own life and writing, while also providing a window into a spiritual destiny shared by thousands of early modern women.

"Meredith Ray and Lynn Westwater have done an excellent job reworking Tarabotti’s labyrinthine, often page-long sentences, skillfully breaking them into readable, truly eloquent English equivalents. The notes supporting the translation are very thoroughly researched, extensive and insightful. The introduction is an indispensable guide to Tarabotti’s account of convent life."

- Elissa Weaver, Professor Emerita of Italian Literature, University of Chicago

MEREDITH K. RAY is Professor of Italian at the University of Delaware. She is co-editor with Lynn Lara Westwater of Arcangela Tarabotti’s Letters Familiar and Formal (2012) in The Other Voice Series.

LYNN LARA WESTWATER is Associate Professor of Italian at The George Washington University. For The Other Voice Series she is co-editor with Meredith K. Ray of Arcangela Tarabotti’s Letters Familiar and Formal (2012) and with Diana Robin of Ippolita Sforza, Duchess and Hostage in Renaissance Naples: Letters and Orations (2017).

REVIEWS
Early Modern Women 17.2 (2023): 402–405. Reviewed by Laura Benedetti.
Italian Culture 39.1 (2021): 94–96. Reviewed by Patrizia Bettella.
Italica 100.1 (2023): 106–108. Reviewed by Chiara Caputi.
Quaderni d'italianistica 42.1 (2021): 312–314. Reviewed by Eleonora Carinci.
Renaissance & Reformation / Renaissance et Réforme 45.4 (2022): 294–296. Reviewed by Nilab Ferozan.
Renaissance Quarterly 76.2 (2023): 653–655. Reviewed by Shannon McHugh.