Wonder Woman is Diana, Princess of Themyscira, an island of Amazons long isolated from the rest of the world, known as Paradise Island by the few aware of it. Prosperous and peaceful in their seclusion, the only thing the Amazons lacked were children, until their ruler Queen Hippolyta appealed to Athena, and was granted a daughter, Diana. She later took up the task of carrying the teachings of the Olympian pantheon and the Amazon way of life to the chaotic, violent 'man's world', where she became known as Wonder Woman. There aren't a lot of comic book characters who are truly universal, known to virtually everyone regardless of whether they read comics or not - Wonder Woman is one of the few to reach the top of the tree, standing alongside Superman, Batman, and Spider-Man as cultural landmarks. Created in 1941, published continually by DC since the company's inception in 1944, altered and refined over the years as writers and trends came and went, Diana has seen more history than the vast majority of her readers. When she was first created, she symbolised writer William Moulton Marston's belief that female empowerment was the way of the future, and that the greatest weapon a hero could employ was not physical power, but love. Basing Diana on the two most important women in his life, his wife and their mutual lover, Marston's heroine employed 'loving submission': rather than achieving victory through force alone, Diana would use her dominance over her enemies to guide them towards accepting her moral code - in short, for love of Diana, they would reform themselves. Since her debut - in which the fetishisation of bondage stands out today - Wonder Woman has come under the aegis of many creative teams, and gone through many phases. George Pérez's influence in recreating Diana after Crisis on Infinite Earths is still strongly felt, in the heavy use of Greek mythology and mythological characters, who were later modernised by Greg Rucka. The plotlines leading into Infinite Crisis were a turning-point for Diana, when she was left with no alternative but to kill the villanous Maxwell Lord, and did so, violating the unspoken creed that superheroes never kill, no matter the circumstances. Following the Crisis, Diana withdrew from the world and spent time in the mystical sanctuary Nanda Parbat, searching for answers to the questions about her own nature she now faced. When she returned, it was with a new determination to experience life not just as a superhero, but as a human as well, and with the help of Bruce Wayne she took on the identity of 'Diana Prince', an agent of the Department of Metahuman Affairs, as whom she mixed with other humans unaware of her true identity, while keeping in touch with the activities of her colelagues and enemies. This reintroduction of Wonder Woman was beset by problems, with initial writer Allan Heinberg habitually late turning in scripts, followed by a heavy-handed editorially-demanded storyline 'Amazons Attack' all but derailing her. Her lead title Wonder Woman has been steadied by the arrival of DC veteran writer Gail Simone, whose recent debut on the title shows much promise. Diana also appears in Justice League of America, as one of the League's founding members, and in the 52 Aftermath: The Four Horsemen miniseries, also featuring the revitalisation of Dr. Veronica Cale, an old foe of Diana's, and following the Crisis her role in the death of Maxwell Lord was revisited in Manhunter. The full list of titles in which Wonder Woman sometimes guest-stars is too extensive to recap - as one of DC's leading lights, she makes appearances practically everywhere sooner or later.