woman of letters

American  

noun

1. a woman engaged in literary pursuits, especially a professional writer.

2. a woman of great learning; scholar.

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Example Sentences

A demimondaine with a shocking reputation, by the time of her death, in 1954, Colette was an institution, the first French woman of letters ever honored with a state funeral.

From New York Times • Feb. 6, 2023

Smaller but scene-stealing walk-on parts go to woman of letters Mary McCarthy, philosopher Hannah Arendt, journalist Murray Kempton, poets June Jordan and Sterling Brown, composer Virgil Thomson, and novelists James Baldwin and Norman Mailer.

From Washington Post • Oct. 20, 2022

But as a woman of letters, she is fascinated by Willy’s bustling literary fiefdom and soon finds her place in it, first as a proofer and then as one of his ghostwriters.

From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 19, 2018

A proto-feminist woman of letters, impresario and poet in her own right, Morewood strikes us in Shelden’s account as a person of imagination and courage straining against the socially imposed constrictions of her time.

From Washington Post • May 26, 2016

In Louise Lab�—La Belle Cordi�re—we meet a warrior, as well as a woman of letters.

From Women of Modern France by Thieme, Hugo P. (Hugo Paul)