Wicked Women: The Podcast

Mary Boleyn has long existed in the shadow of her more famous sister.

When she is remembered at all, she is often reduced to a mistress, a scandal, or “the other Boleyn girl.” Her reputation has been shaped by centuries of gossip, speculation, and sexual judgment but very little attention has been paid to the woman herself.

Yet Mary’s story did not end with Henry VIII. She walked away from the Tudor court, defied her powerful family to marry for love, and became the mother of Catherine Carey.

Possibly fathered by Henry VIII and raised in the aftermath of Anne Boleyn’s execution, Catherine returned to the Tudor court and formed a close, enduring relationship with Elizabeth I. She witnessed some of the most dangerous years of the Tudor dynasty, yet her own role has remained largely hidden.

Today, I’m joined by Wendy J. Dunn, a multi-award-winning Australian author whose work gives voice to the women of Tudor history. Wendy is the author of several works of historical fiction, as well as the nonfiction book Henry VIII’s True Daughter: Catherine Carey. Her latest novel, Shades of Yellow, connects the life of a modern woman with that of Amy Dudley, the often-overlooked wife of Robert Dudley.

Together, we explore Mary Boleyn’s contested reputation, Catherine Carey’s possible royal parentage, the powerful women surrounding Elizabeth I, and how historical fiction can bring us closer to the women who lived behind the closed doors of the Tudor court.
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Bianca Capello led a life of mystery, danger, and love. Born into wealth and surrounded by a family tradition of medicine, she defied convention to rise to the very top of Renaissance Florentine society.

Famously beautiful, Bianca is perhaps best remembered as the mistress and eventual wife of Francesco de’ Medici. But her life and legacy extend far beyond her relationship with one of Florence’s most powerful men.

In today’s episode, I’m joined by Gigi Berardi, author of Bianca’s Cure, to uncover the woman behind the legend. Together, we explore Bianca’s remarkable life, the hidden histories woven into the streets and buildings of Florence, and the women whose contributions to medicine, science, and intellectual life have too often been left out of the historical record.

Music Credit: Renaissance by Audionautix is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license.
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Throughout history, women have held extraordinary power but possessing power did not mean they were free to wield it.

From Cleopatra and the queens of Tudor England to Catherine the Great, Queen Victoria, and beyond, powerful women have repeatedly been remembered through stories of sexuality, vanity, ambition, and failure.

In today’s episode, I’m joined by historian Kate Williams to discuss her latest book, Regina: A New History of Women and Power. We explore what it meant for a woman to rule, how queens crafted their own images, and why the myths surrounding powerful women have proven so difficult to dislodge.

What happens when women take the throne and who gets to decide how we remember them?
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As America prepares to celebrate its 250th anniversary, we are going to hear a lot of familiar stories. We will revisit the Founding Fathers, the great battles, and the documents that changed the course of history.

But here on Wicked Women, we've always been interested in the people history leaves at the edges of the page. The women, the ordinary people, the overlooked figures who lived through extraordinary moments and whose voices can completely transform how we understand the past.

The American Revolution is no exception.

What if this story was never just about thirteen colonies? What if the ideas of liberty, happiness, and justice were being debated by women, Indigenous communities, enslaved people, and people across the globe who were also confronting empire and imagining a different future? What if the Revolution was not inevitable, but uncertain, deeply human, and shaped by countless lives we rarely stop to consider?

Today's guest, historian Sarah Pearsall, invites us to look at this familiar story from an entirely new angle. As we approach America's 250th birthday, perhaps the most meaningful way to honor the past is not simply to repeat the stories we know, but to recover the ones we have forgotten.
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Anne Stanhope is a figure in Tudor history who is often either vilified or forgotten. She was the sister-in-law of Henry VIII’s third queen, Jane Seymour, and her husband would become king in all but name during the reign of their nephew, Edward VI. Yet Anne is perhaps best remembered for her supposed feud with her sister-in-law, Katherine Parr, who referred to Anne as “that hell.” But the image of two women feuding over precedence and jewels fails to capture the remarkable life of one of the Tudor court’s rare survivors.

In today’s episode, I’m joined by historian Rebecca Batley, author of The Lord Protector and His Wives: Catherine Filliol, Anne Stanhope and Edward Seymour. We discuss Anne’s life, her incredible survival in a dangerous royal world, and the long-standing tendency to pit powerful women against one another.
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