DISOBEDIENT – a Times book of the year
An exhilarating novel. Through effervescent prose, Elizabeth Fremantle brings the story of artist Artemisia Gentileschi to life. Gripping, captivating, and consistently enlightening, DISOBEDIENT firmly places Gentileschi as one of the greatest artists and heroines in history.
KATY HESSEL (author of The Story of Art Without Men)
KATY HESSEL (author of The Story of Art Without Men)
ROME 1611.
A place of change, with sumptuous new palaces
and lavish wealth on display.
A city where women are seen but not heard.
Artemisia Gentileschi dreams of becoming a great artist. Motherless, she is raised in a family of painters – men and boys. She knows she has more talent than them all, but she cannot choose her own future. Neither her brilliance nor her defiance can change the fact that she belongs to her father and will belong to a husband.
As she perfects her craft, a mysterious painting tutor enters her life. Tassi is a dashing figure, handsome and worldly, and for a moment he represents everything that a life of freedom might offer. But then the unthinkable happens. A violent act that threatens Artemisia’s entire world. In the eyes of her family, Artemisia must accept her fate. In the eyes of the law, she is the villain.
But Artemisia is a survivor.
And this is her story to tell.
The descriptive power of the novel transported me straight to the heart of Renaissance Rome with some passages so beautiful I had to read them twice. Fremantle’s Artemisia is passionate, brilliant, absolutely true to herself and is now one of my favourite fictional characters of all time. ELODIE HARPER (bestselling author of The wolf Den)
A place of change, with sumptuous new palaces
and lavish wealth on display.
A city where women are seen but not heard.
Artemisia Gentileschi dreams of becoming a great artist. Motherless, she is raised in a family of painters – men and boys. She knows she has more talent than them all, but she cannot choose her own future. Neither her brilliance nor her defiance can change the fact that she belongs to her father and will belong to a husband.
As she perfects her craft, a mysterious painting tutor enters her life. Tassi is a dashing figure, handsome and worldly, and for a moment he represents everything that a life of freedom might offer. But then the unthinkable happens. A violent act that threatens Artemisia’s entire world. In the eyes of her family, Artemisia must accept her fate. In the eyes of the law, she is the villain.
But Artemisia is a survivor.
And this is her story to tell.
The descriptive power of the novel transported me straight to the heart of Renaissance Rome with some passages so beautiful I had to read them twice. Fremantle’s Artemisia is passionate, brilliant, absolutely true to herself and is now one of my favourite fictional characters of all time. ELODIE HARPER (bestselling author of The wolf Den)
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DISOBEDIENT tells the powerful story of Artemisia Gentileschi, the most celebrated female painter of the seventeenth century. It follows the events of a single year that culminate in the city’s most infamous trial, during which Artemisia was forced to defend her character under brutal, public, testimony. The experience shaped her art; Artemisia went on to create fierce biblical paintings that were, in the words of the Guardian, “a war cry for oppressed women”. 
Judith Slaying Holofernes
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Find details of the US edition here
US Cover
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