9 Anne Askew LIKE as the armèd knight Appointed to the field, With this world will I fight, And faith shall be my shield. More enemies now I have Than hairs upon my head. Let them not me deprave But fight thou in my stead
M
any women writers were attacked for their views – Mary Wroth was savaged by half the nobility of London, Delarivier Manley was arrested The Ballad which for scandalum magnatum, Olympe de Anne Askew made Gouges was sent to the guillotine. But and sang when she probably no other female writer apart was in Newgate from Anne Askew (1520 – 1546) has ever been thrown out of the house and sued for divorce by her husband, imprisoned in both Newgate prison and the Tower of London, tortured on the rack, twice and written about it both times, then burnt at the stake for her views. 52
