Despite the fact that Li Qingzhao and Anna Petrovna Bunina were not related either geographically or temporally, contemporaries called them Chinese and Russian Sappho. The reason for this was the consonance of their poems to the lyrics of the ancient Greek poetess, the sensuality of the poems they wrote, as well as their independent position, not typical for women of their eras. This article is devoted to comparing the biographies of two outstanding poetesses, each of whom is considered the founder of women's poetry in her own country. Despite the fame of both poetesses and their status as pioneers of women's literature, their work is compared almost for the first time. In addition to their high social status and good education, both poetesses are connected by the fact that their destinies violated the traditional canon of women's behavior: instead of patriarchal family life, they chose self-realization in creativity. The exclusivity of their position, which put them in the focus of public attention and made them pariahs in their own way, on the other hand, gave freedom of choice of issues and artistic language. This allowed them to become the founders of women's poetry, to develop their own artistic manner. It is this circumstance that typologically brings together the work of two poetesses, separated from each other by eight centuries. The subject matter of their work is surprisingly similar, but the imagery is completely different, because it is conditioned by the literary tradition of each country.