Marie Le Jars de Gournay

Born in Paris in 1565, Marie Le Jars de Gournay was a French writer, essayist, translator, and editor who built a reputation through sheer self-education. She became closely associated with Michel de Montaigne after admiring his Essays, and he later called her his “adopted daughter.” After his death, she played a major role in preparing and publishing a new edition of the Essays, which helped preserve and shape his legacy.

Gournay also wrote boldly in her own right. She argued for the equality of women and men in works such as The Equality of Men and Women and The Ladies’ Grievance, making her one of the early feminist voices in French literature. Alongside her essays, she translated classical texts and wrote on language, morality, and society.

She died in 1645, but her work continues to attract readers interested in women’s intellectual history, Renaissance literature, and the world around Montaigne. What makes her especially memorable is how fearlessly she claimed space in a literary culture that rarely welcomed women as equals.