The True Story of Lidia Poët
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Netflix's new period drama, The Law According to Lidia Poët, follows Lidia Poët (Matilda De Angelis), the first woman attorney in Italy. Did Lidia Poët really exist? Is the Italian show a true story? The answers: Yes and kinda!
Poët was born in 1855 in Traverse, Italy, the youngest of four brothers and three sisters. She attended the University of Turin, where she received her law degree in June 1881, writing a thesis on women's status in society and women's right to vote. Two years later, she was admitted to the Order of Lawyers and Prosecutors of Turin. However, she only practiced law for three months before she was disbarred. In 1920, when she was 65, Poët was finally admitted to the bar thanks to a 1919 law that allowed women to practice as lawyers.
The show uses this is as a starting point, even if it doesn't stick to the historical record—it's more of a procedural, with each episode focused on Poët solving a different case. Historian Clara Bounous, who wrote Lidia Poët: Una Donna Moderna (a modern woman), tells Italy 24 News of the show, "This is not a biography, it is not the true story of Lidia." Bounous adds, though the show "does not fully tell her story, [it] nevertheless makes known, at least, the name of Lidia Poët."
One of Poët's only living relatives, Marilena Jahier Togliatto, who was a distant grand-niece of the lawyer, told La Stampa there are some big differences between Lidia's life and the Netflix show, saying it was "too fictionalized" for her liking—though she only watched episode one. "She never lived in a villa in Turin. She lived in Pinerolo, in a historic house in the centre, above the arcades. What was the need to twist history? She was already adventurous enough staying true to reality," Togliatto said. In addition, "Lidia's brother wasn’t married either, while a wife appears quite a lot in the series: the two of them lived alone with the servants, they were a very well-off family and both thought only and exclusively of work."
Lidia Poët was committed to feminist causes throughout her life, joining the Consiglio Nazionale delle Donne Italiane (the National Council of Italian Women) upon its founding in 1903, and advocated for women's suffrage. No full-length biographies of her currently exist in English, but if you're fluent in Italian, you can read Chiara Viale's Lidia e le altre. Pari opportunità ieri e oggi: l’eredità di Lidia Poët (Lydia and the others. Equal opportunities yesterday and today: the legacy of Lidia Poët).
Poët never married, did not have children, and passed away in 1949 at age 94.
The Law According to Lidia Poët is now streaming on Netflix.
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