Princess Michael of Kent, the author and royal, has told The Huffington Post UK she believes women today have "the courage to do everything" - although "we have to accept" that women and men are physically different.
The princess, who is married to The Queen's cousin, spoke ahead of the launch of her latest book, and said some great women in history have been ignored because there are few men writers "who can convincingly write about women".
In Quicksilver, her new historical novel set in 15th Century France, she writes about a male main character for the first time.
“It’s the first time that I’m actually writing about a man as my central character, which was a little scary, but I hope I’ve got him right," the Princess said at Kensington Palace.
“You know the old saying that men are from Mars and women are from Venus? It is a completely different character."
Quicksilver is the third book in The Anjou Trilogy, and is based on the real-life story of Jacques Coeur, a merchant who rose to become one of the most powerful men in France.
"I think that there are relatively few women writers who get the character of men convincingly in their biographies, and there are relatively few, to my opinion, male writers who convincing write about women," the Princess said.
"I think that’s why there are so few biographies written before the 20th century of women, and great women of the time, because men didn’t write about women.
"There were great women, like Yolande, the heroine of the four kingdoms and the principle character in the first book, who really have been ignored by writers because the writers are men.
"Of course, in the 20th and 21st century that changed, and many more men have written about women, but I think women understand women better and men understand men better.”
Princess Michael sat down with HuffPost UK to discuss romance, power, marriage and feminism - saying she thinks Margaret Thatcher becoming a "very successful" prime minister is a good example of the "courage" women have today.
She revealed she is a fan of Downton Abbey, written by her friend Julian Fellowes, when she is able to see it.
“If I had time to watch television I could not write books," she said. "This is my great problem".
She is usually given an entire series on DVD at Christmas, she said, "Then I spend a weekend watching, non stop.”
She agreed that women are more likely to read books or watch TV programmes set in the past, saying it was a "question of time".
“Who’s got the time to read? I personally want to read all of my books onto tape or disc or whatever, so that people who travel a lot can hear the story in their cars.
"I think women have more time to read about this kind of historical past – men, when they read, perhaps read more about their professional work or more about what’s going in the financial world or the political world."