Lieutenant Nun: Memoir of a Basque Transvestite in the New World

Born in 1585, Catalina de Erauso led one of the most wildly fantastic lives of any woman in history. Refusing to be regimented into the quiet habits of a nun's life, she escaped from a Basque convent at age fourteen dressed as a man, and continuing her deception, ventured to Peru and Chile as a soldier in the Spanish army. After mistakenly killing her own brother in a duel, she roamed the Andean highlands, becoming a gambler and a killer, and always just evading the grasp of the law. Distinguished for her fighting skills and cursed with a quick temper, Catalina de Erauso spent much of her life balancing precariously between valor and villainy.
One of the earliest known autobiographies by a woman, Lieutenant Nun offers a portrait of a bold young girl who defied her society's gender roles, yet remained committed to its service as a participant in the conquest of the Americas. She is an adored folkloric hero of the Spanish-speaking world, and this delightful translation introduces a new audience to the audacious escapades of Catalina de Erauso, the Lieutenant Nun.