Aphra Behn

 I was tied into Aphra Behn's biography as soon as I read that her reputation was founded on “her scandalous plays, which she claimed would not have been criticized for impropriety had a man written them”. As I continued to read, I found her life history interesting as well. While much of her early life is unknown, her life as a writer really began after the death of her husband. Aphra Behn suffered by being left with no funds as well as being put into what was referred to as “debtors prison”. After, she began writing and making a living to support herself through her works of theater, novels, and poetry. She used inspiration from her own life, from as little to peoples names as well as lives of people within her community. Her writings show a sense of strength, incomparable to any other writer from everything that she had been through. While Aphra Behn lived a mysterious life, her efforts to make a living based off of her works is quite admirable. I didn’t know before reading this that Aphra Behn was considered to be one of the first women to earn her living from her own writing. I think her place in literature is well deserved and should be celebrated not only because she was a woman writing during this time, but also for how greatly unique her pieces were.