Meredith Ray is the Krieger-Eisenhower Professor of Italian at Johns Hopkins University. She is the author of numerous books on women in early modern Italy, and her research has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Fulbright Foundation, and others. With Lynn Westwater, she has edited and translated several works by the Venetian nun Arcangela Tarabotti. She lives in Philadelphia.