Steve Missey
1. Janie from Their Eyes Were Watching God
2. Nichole Burnell or Dolores Driscoll from The Sweet Hereafter
3. Lila Mae Watson from The Intuitionist
4. Hester Prynne from The Scarlet Letter (only if they did Am Lit bonus reading, though)
5. Mother from Ragtime
6. Emilia from Othello

Bill George
I'd second Penlope and add
Molly Bloom from Ulysses, Nora Helmer from A Doll House, Dilsey from The Sound and the Fury

Dave Callon
A few that come to mind: Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Isabel Archer from James' *Portrait of a Lady*, Hester Prynne of *The Scarlet Letter*

Tim Curdt
Here's a quick list from what they might (or should) have read (Penelope would work nicely...I'm glad someone recognized her. I also second Steve's recommendations for Janie and Emilia)
Beatrice from Much Ado About Nothing ("I would eat his heart in the marketplace"...YES!!!!!!!)
Juliet from Romeo and Juliet ("They are but beggars that can count their worth...." Lovely....
Ruby from Cold Mountain ("You can't have a peckin' rooster..." Ouch....)

Rich Moran
Here's my list of the fifteen greatest heroines in literature. Some of these are admirable characters, some are morally dubious, but all compel the imagination.
1. Dorothea in George Elliot's Middlemarch
2. Hedda Gabler in Ibsen's Hedda Gabler
3. Elizabeth in Austen's Pride and Prejudice
4. Antigone in Soiphocles Antigone
5. Ursula in D.H. Lawrence's The Rainbow
6. Emma in Austen's Emma
7. Rosalind in Shakespeare's As You Like It
8. The Duchess of Malfi in Webster's The Duchess of Malfi
9. Jane Eyre in Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre
10. Nora in Ibsen's The Dollhouse
11. Gertrude Morel in D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers
12. Cleopatra in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra
13, Anna Karenina in Tolstoy's Anna Karenina
14. Martha in Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf
15. Kate Miskin in the P.D. James detective novels, including A Certain Justice & Unsuitable Job for a Woman

Barb Osburg
I know I'm tardy in this chat, but once I read it, Rich had all of my answers. Lila Mae Watson (whom Steve mentioned)is a really interesting heroine in Whitehead's The Intuitionist, but not many people know her. Miss Elizabeth Bennett is my favorite of all time, though perhaps Antigone is more heroic. I'd pick Hester, but as Anne Sexton pointed out in her wonderful poem, "Courage," Hester seems more about love than heroism. Sexton's poem says that when a soldier saves his buddy in the war, that isn't courage, it's "love, as simple as shaving soap."
To that extent, if we debate definitions, love is such a selfish thing (even when we reach outward to save the beloved) that heroism seems to require sacrifice for an idea or people with whom we do not have intimacy of heart. Anyway, I'm jetlagged so most of this probably doesn't make sense.
It was fun to see people's lists!