Carolin Emcke & Anke Engelke: »obstinate, headstrong girl!«

About strong-willed women

From an early age, girls learn to be obedient and fit in, not to be difficult or demanding or too strong-willed. This social expectation is reflected and depicted in fairy tales and songs, in poems and novels. But literature also tells us about those women who were smart or independent, causing them to fall outside the norm, to be unruly and nonconformist and to stand up against taboos and conventions. Carolin Emcke and Anke Engelke read angry and funny texts, upsetting and encouraging ones about strong-willed women in literature – by the Brothers Grimm, Simone de Beauvoir, Mely Kiyak, Jeanette Winterson and many others.