Search - The Book of Margery Kempe (Norton Critical Editions)

Margery Kempe is interesting within the context of Medieval Christianity. She was a mystic who received permission from her husband (a requirement of the church) and a dissolution of her marriage responsibilities by the church to travel freely and spread her revelations from God. Her 'showings' are sometimes bizarre, sometimes painfully poignant and uniquely framed by her situation as a daughter of man serving a God who according to the church at the time, didn't traditionally call women to his service. Her accounts of the people she meets, those who receive her and those who reject her are distinctly human. Viewed through a contemporary lens, she can seem desperate, needy, vindictive, flawed and utterly obsessive about God, her true love and lover. However, this is an important record of a unique woman with a rare and special statue situated in a rich era of church history.

Margery Kempe! What else to say other than she was the most controversial mystic of all time. After giving birth to fourteen kids and failing in business as a brewmaster, she had a vision from none other than God on High! God gave her the "gift of tears" and Margery roamed the planet wailing uncontrollably for years. Most of her contemporaries hated her, but she got a book written about/by her self at a time when women in literature were unheard of. Incredible story about a mystic that reminds me of Chaucer's Wyf of Bath.