Lieutenant Nun | 
 enlarge | Authors: Catalina De Erauso, Michele Stepto, Catalina De Erauso, Gabri Stepto
Publisher: Beacon Press
Category: Book
List Price: $17.00
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Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 250291
Media: Paperback
Edition: 1
Pages: 128
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5.4 x 0.5
ISBN: 0807070734
Dewey Decimal Number: 946
UPC: 046442070737
EAN: 9780807070734
ASIN: 0807070734
Publication Date: June 30, 1997
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Bent cover, and pages
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com Review
Marjorie Garber (iVested Interests: Cross-Dressing and Cultural Anxiety/i), provides a lively introduction to this picaresque autobiography of a 17th-century nun turned cross-dressing soldier. De Erauso's story itself is a swashbuckler's catalogue of sword fights, daring escapes, damsels in distress, and witty repartee. Even if only half of what de Erauso claims about herself is true, it's a life well worth remembering and an utterly wonderful read.
Product Description
Memoir of a Basque Transvestite in the New WorldBRBRTranslated by Michele Stepto and Gabriel SteptoBRBRForeword by Marjorie GarberBRBRThe memoir of a 16th century Basque woman who escaped a convent dressed as a boy became a soldier in the Spanish army, killed her own brother, and managed to become the darling of the Pope and the Spanish-speaking world.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Life's more fun as a man than a nun June 24, 2004
Lynn Harnett (Marathon, FL USA)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Celebrated in Spanish legends and folklore as the marvelous Lieutenant Nun, Catalina de Erauso was born to a prosperous Basque family in 1585 and sent to a convent at age 4. Destined to become a nun, there she remained until age 15. Days before she was to take her final vows, she escaped, taking only needle, thread, scissors and a few coins.pDespite her previously sheltered existence, de Erauso plunged into her new, wordly life as a man with unusual gusto, as described in her memoir, Lieutenant Nun.pWritten some 20 years after her flight, when she correctly deemed confession of her ruse and her still virginal state might save her from the rope or an even more ignominious fate, the memoir describes at breathtaking pace a life of soldiering, banditry and dueling in the wilds of Peru and Chile.pWhile this slim volume is packed with action, there is little self-reflection or explanation. Transforming her convent undergarments to boy's clothing, she quickly obtains a position with a scholar, runs off when he apparently exhibits too much attention in the boy, and becomes a page at the king's Court.pBut when her father (who does not recognize her) appears at court, distraught over his daughter's disappearance, she slips away again. After two comfortable years as a page elsewhere, she quits, for no more reason than it suited me, returns to her hometown, sees her mother in church (who also fails to recognize her) and leaves, drifting until she finds work as a cabin boy on her uncle's galleon.pWhile convent education may have fitted her for work as a page, nothing had prepared her for shipboard life. The work was new to me and I had a hard time at first, is all she has to say about that.br brFinding favor with her uncle, who knows her only as another Basque, she jumps ship in the New World, stealing 500 of his pesos and makes her way aboard merchant ships, beginning a pattern of prospering until some slight to her pride causes her to retaliate with knife or sword, necessitating flight or, if captured, jail time, church sanctuaries and scantily described negotiations among law officers, churchmen and the aggrieved parties.pNeeding money she signs on as a soldier, serves with an older brother she had never met, and endures three years of misery fighting Indians with everything but discomfort in short supply .pFollowing a disastrous duel in which she kills her brother, de Erauso's career takes a downswing into banditry and the life of a gambler with brawling and knife fights involving several brushes with the gallows.pAlthough wounded in battle and once stripped for the rack, de Erauso never explains how she conceals her gender. Her attitude seems entirely that of the colonial male. One murderous knife fight, for instance, is justified when my companion, with plenty of people around to hear it, told me I lied like a cuckold.pHer well-timed confession to a sympathetic bishop not only saved her from prosecution, but made her a celebrity. She was later granted dispensation by the Pope to live as a man and she finished her life as a merchant in Mexico.pDe Erauso's delivery is deadpan and devoid of introspection. There is no purple prose, quite the opposite. While the pace is headlong, it raises more questions than it answers. But Michelle Stepto's useful introduction fills in much of the essential historical and social background, yielding a fascinating portrait of a very peculiar adventurer's life in colonial Chile.
 A Different Conquistador July 31, 2000
10 out of 11 found this review helpful
Catalina de Erauso grew up in a Basque convent, but spent most of her days as a soldier in the Spanish army in the mid-1600s. This brief autobiography is not a typical tale of military exploits. Although brawling constitutes much of the action, this is the story of a female transvestite. De Erauso dressed as a man to escape from her convent in 1599. Keeping up the disguise for reasons that included an attraction to pretty faces, she traveled to the Americas in 1603 and fought in the conquest of Chile. When finally forced to reveal her true sex, de Erauso attained brief celebrity in the Baroque world. In 1624, the pope granted her permission to continue her life garbed in male attire. A forword and an excellent introduction by the translators places this fascinating story in historical context.
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