The Crannied Wall explores the ways in which women in general, and religious women in particular, participated in the spiritual and cultural life of Europe in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Focusing primarily on women's religious communities, it provides a glimpse not only of the richness and range of creative experience that went on there, but also of the social forces that influenced such experience. Craig Monson incorporates essays in music history, iconography, art history, drama, autobiography, religious history, and witchcraft. Music and drama are revealed as important strategic resources that some cloistered women employed to transcend the convent wall that kept them isolated from the outside world. Other essays expand our perspective on men's and women's views of female sanctity and women's relationship to the supernatural. Highlighting a largely neglected area of female autobiography, a discussion of women's stories of their own lives provides further valuable insight into their perception of existence. The Crannied Wall presents aspects of women's issues that have been largely unexplored in print. It should be of interest to teachers and scholars in several fields, including women's studies, religious and cultural history, and the arts.