Poet, dramatist, and scholar Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz became a nun because convent life allowed her time to study and write and considerable freedom for a woman of her era. Born about 1651 to a family of modest means in what is now Mexico, Sor Juana displayed exceptional intelligence as a child, and in 1664 she was invited by the viceroy of New Spain to serve as a lady-in-waiting at court. She had no interest in marriage and began her life as a nun with a brief stay in the strict religious order of the Discalced Carmelites. In 1669 she moved to the more lenient Convent of Santa Paula of the Hieronymite order in Mexico City, and there she took her vows. She remained cloistered in the Convent of Santa Paula for the rest of her life.
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