PROFILES
8 MARCH/APRIL 2020France’s
First Lady
of Letters1405
The Book of the City of
Ladies is published, in
which Christine honors
the role of notable women
throughout history.1400s
Christine’s literary
criticism centers on
the literary portrayal of
women. Her poems win
her powerful patrons.circa 1389
After a 10-year marriage,
Christine becomes a
widow and chooses
to support her family
through her writing.1364
Christine de Pisan is born
in Venice. At age four,
she will move with her
family to join the court of
French king Charles V.Christine de Pisan:
France’s First Lady of Letters
The brilliant poet, critic, and champion of women upended medieval norms by staying
single and became France’s first woman to make a living as a writer.
INKWELL, 15TH CENTURY, LOUVRE MUSEUM, PARISConventional widows would have
remarried, but Christine decided
to earn her own living as a writer.F
or a daughter to receive the same
education as a son was rare in the
mid-14th century, and Christine
de Pisan’s childhood was one
such exception. Born in Venice in
1364 and raised in France, Christine (also
known as Christina) used the advantages
of her early education to forge a prolific
writing career to support herself and her
family, an unprecedented achievement for
the time. A poet and biographer, Christine
celebrated remarkable female figures in
her works, including an account of Joan
of Arc written during her lifetime.
Christine’s father was a Bolognese
physician and astrologer, Tommaso da
Pizzano. His reputation as an intellec-
tual secured him employment as the
court astrologer of King Charles V of
France. Tommasso moved the family
there when Christine was four. She had
two younger brothers, and Tommasso—
an open-minded man for the times—de-
cided to provide a formal education for all
three children. Christine received lessons
in Greek, Latin, great works of literature,
history, philosophy, and medicine. A
voracious reader, she was known to have
spent hours in the library of the royal
palace of the Louvre, which had
been founded by her father’s
patron, Charles V.Wife Then Widow
Alongside her desire to soak up knowl-
edge, Christine de Pisan also demon-
strated precocious literary flair. As a
child, she composed songs and ballads
that delighted members of the court.
Her father, who gained prestige in King
Charles V’s inner circle, did his utmost
to ensure an advantageous marriage
for his daughter as soon as she was old
enough to wed. In 1379, age 15, Christine
married Étienne du Castel, a notary and
secretary to the king. It was, by Chris-
tine’s own account, a blissfully happy
union. The pair had three children: two
sons and a daughter.
A few years later Christine lost her
father, and then her husband died soon
afterward in an epidemic (some sources
say the bubonic plague) around 1389. At
age 25, Christine became a widow with
three children and a mother to support.
Her brothers had returned to Italy and
could not help her.
The conventional solution at the time
would have been to seek out a new hus-
band and remarry, but Christine took a
different course of action. She decided
to carry on alone and support her fam-
ily with her own literary talents. As she
wrote in her journal: “I had to become
a man.”STÉPHANE MARÉCHALLE/RMN-GRAND PALAIScirca 1430
A year after her
“Tale of Joan of Arc”
celebrates the Maid of
Orleans, Christine dies,
around age 65.