She was, however, not interested in Cinderella-ing herself up a pretty dress and a regal life: instead, Erauso made some dudes’ duds and took on the name “Francisco de Loyola.” She then set about chasing her dreams – which were apparently to drink, fight, and womanize. So at age 15 she escaped her holdings, grabbing fabric to spin herself up a new costume, and thus a new identity. Cooped up in a Spanish convent since from the age of 4, Erauso gradually grew more frustrated with her lack of freedom, not to mention the regular beatings from the nuns. More on that later.Įrauso started out her once-upon-a-times with a prison break and a clothing swap.
For it’s only when one gives Erauso’s story a deeper inspection that her true cleverness reveals itself – after all, it’s not your everyday thug who is able to gin up a meeting with the Pope and get special dispensation to crossdress. Her cycles of kill/hide/escape/repeat are so frequent that her story jumps rapidly from off-putting, to cartoonish, to… intriguing. Such is the life of Catalina de Erauso, whose madcap disguised-as-a-man travels across South America come across like a 17th century episode of Cops. You know you’re in for a bumpy ride when you pick up an autobiography only to find that the author kills someone in a bar fight roughly every 5-6 pages.
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