What is it about history's wicked women that is so riveting? Why should difficult and different instantly mean dangerous? Irish-Indian poet Nikita Gill is taking back the fairy tales, Greek and Hindu myths, challenging our ingrained fear of the 'difficult' woman as hard and callous, not nurturing or maternal. Instead she's giving them a shift of perspective to bring some of literature's most maligned or underwritten female characters out of the shadows. She talks to Mihingarangi about how powerful women would be if we only protected and helped each other and why "softness" in women is often another way of men telling them to be quiet. Nikita has nearly 850,000 Instagram followers worldwide for her work and has written seven poetry collections and two novels. Her latest book is Hekate which she'll discuss at the Auckland Writer's Festival.

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