Sofya Vasilevneya Kovalevskaya is a famous female Russian mathematician:
who made noteworthy contributions to analysis, partial differential equations and mechanics. She was a pioneer for women in mathematics around the world – the first woman to obtain a doctorate (in the modern sense) in mathematics, the first woman appointed to a full professorship in Northern Europe and one of the first women to work for a scientific journal as an editor.[1] According to historian of science Ann Hibner Koblitz, Kovalevskaia was "the greatest known woman scientist before the twentieth century"
In the 20th Century, the most famous female mathematician is Emmy Noether and
she was described by Pavel Alexandrov, Albert Einstein, Jean Dieudonné, Hermann Weyl and Norbert Wiener as the most important woman in the history of mathematics. As one of the leading mathematicians of her time, she developed the theories of rings, fields, and algebras. In physics, Noether's theorem explains the connection between symmetry and conservation laws.
The articles above list a number of books describing their achievements and life-story, amongst them are:
Kennedy, Don H. (1983). Little Sparrow, a Portrait of Sofia Kovalevsky. Athens: Ohio University Press.
Koblitz, Ann Hibner (1993). A Convergence of Lives: Sofia Kovalevskaia -- Scientist, Writer, Revolutionary.
and
- Tent, M.B.W. (2008), Emmy Noether: The Mother of Modern Algebra
I can't resist mentioning that Sofia also wrote a memoir later in life, titled A Russian Childhood, where she described Dostoyevsky as ugly and also how she first discovered a fascination for mathematics:
She used to stare fascinated at one of the walls of one of the rooms in the Palibino estate which had been covered with the lithographed noted of a calculus course ... Kovalevskaya apparently believed that this haphazard introduction to the subject nevertheless gave her a familiarity with the symbols and formulas of the calculus.
(quoted from The Mathematics of Sofia Kovalevskaya)
As for a book about for young girls and which is about the paradoxes and peculiarities of logic, language and reasoning and written in a vivid, personable style you can't beat Alice in Wonderland and Alice through the Looking-Glass. I expect this is available in Italian.
Another possibility is Rosalind Franklin, who although is not a mathematician, as an X-ray crystallographer would have definitely have used mathematics in her work in obtaining the data for the structure of DNA. Her life is outlined in:
- Cambridge Women: twelve Portraits (CUP).
