Wyuen Pyne: a reckoning of women's voices

by Jean G-Owen

Wyuen Pyne is a medieval phrase meaning ‘women’s pain, women’s punishment’. Across centuries, women’s refusal to conform has been staged as spectacle: ducking stools plunging so-called scolds into rivers, bridles forcing tongues to stillness, racks stretching bodies in the name of faith. These punishments were both acts of law and public performances designed to choreograph female obedience.

This book answers back. Blending poetry, prose, herstory, cultural commentary and images, Wyuen Pyne reimagines women whose names survive in fragments, whose stories were bent into allegory or whose defiance was branded as sin. From Lilith, the first to say No, to Scheherazade, who turned storytelling into survival, it gathers saints, mothers, daughters, thinkers, rebels and witnesses across scripture, folklore, courtroom records and myth. But the reckoning doesn’t stop at the past. It cuts into the present, where women’s voices confront new forms of control.

104 pages, Paperback

Published November 29, 2025

Reviews

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolutely astonishing and powerful feminist collection of short stories, poems, analyses and mini essays about historical and fictional women. It is brilliantly written and utterly jammed with emotion and strength.

I had chills exploring these sometimes quiet, sometimes loud acts of resistance and feminine voice – from women who suffered due to the Malleus Maleficarum to the stories of Lilith and Pope Joan to Jenny Pipes and the continual ‘replaying’ of her ducking on the clockface at Leominster to a fantastically acerbic invented address from Molly Bloom towards James Joyce.

There was something so exhilarating, and yet chilling, about reading this collection – it is a warning, a celebration, and a rallying cry. It really deserves to be read so widely, by everyone. So many important messages between its covers and delivered in such a compelling way.

A brilliant contribution to ‘herstory’.

[Emily Gillatt-Ball · Rating 5 out of 5]

Compelling and thought-provoking, the book is more than a study of how women were made to suffer for speaking out, being different or daring to say no, with acceptable femininity synonymised with obedience; better, this is a positive and triumphant celebration of those who dared, and those who still dare, to resist society’s expectations and defy, rather than comply.

Wyuen Pyne consists of a collection of short and engaging pieces of non-fiction, storytelling and poetry, based on historical events, folklore and classic literature. These are interspersed with quotes and images to re-imagine the voices of women they tried to silence. An erudite and enjoyable read.

[Jenny Danielsson · Rating 5 out of 5]

The subject matter of this book is harsh - we learn about women who, over the centuries, suffered at the hands of men for just being themselves. Yes, it’s awful to read about the ducking stool in the author’s rural hometown or the noblewoman Beatrice Cenci, who was led to the scaffold in Rome in 1599. Even so, this is a book you shouldn’t miss. The author guides the reader through these stories with ease, a sharp pen, and wonderful bits of poetry. The book is structured with great skill and an amazing sense of pace, and it’s impossible not to engage with the text. I also enjoy the author’s choice of illustrations, made in hard black with a touch of goth.

I can best describe the weeks it has taken me to read this book as both an intricate and joyous conversation. First and foremost, a discussion with the women and men portrayed in the book, but also a refreshing exchange of ideas with my own time. We can all do better by each other. And we can learn to respect the No of others.