Women Who Run with the Wolves. The archetype of the Wild Woman in myths and legends

According to Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D., healthy wolves and healthy women share certain mental characteristics: acuteness, playful spirit, and deep devotion. Wolves and women are related by nature, inquisitive, endowed with endurance and strength. While studying wolves, Dr. Estes first crystallized the concept of the Wild Woman archetype. In the book, which became a world bestseller and a sensation of The New York Times, Estes reveals this archetype, deciphers ancient legends and long-known children's fairy tales, and also explains it with examples from his psychoanalytic practice.

"Women Who Run With Wolves" began as notes in 1970, and already in 1971, Estes took up the text. The author completed the book, "a work about the love and resurrection of the women of our world", in twenty years; during that time, she was rejected 42 times, until the book was first published by Ballantine/Random House in 1992. In 1995, an updated edition with an appendix and a new wolf tale was published.