The 17th-century Mexican nun, whose real name was Juana de Asbaje, is an extraordinary figure - an intellectual prodigy, the last great poet of the Spanish Baroque, a scholar, a religious mystic, and a woman who obeyed her bishop in matters of conscience even when it adversely affected her writing. Sor Juana also had strong views on the relationship between the sexes, and expressed them sharply in her writings, including one much-anthologised poem which looks forward to modern feminism. The long prose piece which opens this collection is a kind of apologia pro vita sua; the rest of the volume is made up of her poems. Spanish and English are given on facing pages, as they should be.