This book traces Constance Markievicz’s journey from a pampered childhood in a Sligo landlord’s mansion to her participation in Ireland’s literary and political Renaissance. The little-known story of her daughter Maeve and her son-in-law Stanislaw, is also recorded. Paintings by Constance, produced while in solitary confinement in Holloway Jail, are reproduced in this book for the first time ever.

Her meeting and marriage to the aristocratic Count Dunin Markievicz at art school in Paris is detailed here. It describes how on their return to Dublin she threw her lot in with the poor, running soup kitchens during the workers’ strikes and Dublin Lockout of 1913.

Her political awakening led to her championing women’s rights and her eventual command of a company of the Irish Citizen Army during the Easter Rebellion. Sentenced to death and incarcerated in a British prison she became not just the first woman ever elected to the British Parliament, but, as Minister for Labour, the first woman Cabinet Minister in Europe. Her heroic endurance during several prison terms and her correspondence with her sister Eva is documented here.