Un acercamiento a Nueva España en el Siglo XVII: La vida y las obras de Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

An Approach to New Spain in the Seventeenth Century: The Life and Works of Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz

According to Jaime Delgado, "Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz was, without a doubt, a woman ahead of her tim e."3 He could not be more correct. She was an innovator, the first European colonial woman to question widely held beliefs and propose a new order. Sor Juana lived during the seventeenth century in the viceroyalty of New Spain (present day Mexico), and has become known as an intellectual, a poet, and a feminist. Certainly she was a poet and an intellectual, but it is difficult to classify her as a feminist without a clear definition of feminism.

Sor Juana was a prolific writer, whose works include not only poems, but essays and dramas as well. Her worked addressed many themes and employed numerous styles. However, it is essential to read her work from her perspective, because she wrote them for a reason—to present opposing ideas to what was popularly accepted thought concerning the relationship between men and women, government and the people, and the authority of the Catholic Church.