"Writing for me is not an empty whim. But a need of the soul, granted from above…" (Sor Juana)

Juana Inés de la Cruz (de Asbaje y Ramírez de Santillana, 1651-1695) – the first national poetess of Mexico, a lady-in-waiting at the Mexican court, who entered a convent at the age of seventeen: "I longed to be alone, longed to free myself from the smallest obligation that might hinder my service to the sciences." The monastery cell became her temple of science.

From her contemporaries – the Spanish publishers of her first book "Inundación castálida" (Madrid, 1689) and her collected works (Zaragoza, 1692) – Sor Juana received lavish titles: "The Mexican Phoenix", "the unique", "the incomparable American poetess" and "The Tenth Muse".

The RUDN University Library holds the first Russian-language edition of Sor Juana's poems, which is titled precisely that – "The Tenth Muse" (1966). This is the most striking work of the translator Inna Mikhailovna Chezhegova (1929–1990) and the artist Vladimir Ivanovich Surikov (1924-1985), who created the recognizable design style for the books of the series "Library of Latin American Poetry" (1962-1985).

This small collection of lyrical poetry covers only a small part of the poetess's poetic legacy, but in all the richness of the verse forms she virtuously mastered: these are the old Spanish gloss and the Castilian redondilla, the Spanish décima and the Creole romance, as well as the sonnet, elegy and lyre.

Over time, the "Mexican Phoenix", writes I.M. Chezhegova, became disillusioned with science and literature, sold her rich library and devoted herself to charity and prayer: "In the captivity of primordial laziness, sleep, my mind, and return to me the days killed by reflection, taken away from life".