Review Bale's Book of Margery Kempe offers the best modern version of the text and the most comprehensive and judicious assessment of scholarly and critical environments in which to read this strange and wondrous work... Bale sensitively reviews all the textual, critical and ideological challenges of the work. His modern English is supple and responsive. (Times Literary Supplement, Seth Lerer)This lively new edition preserves the author's forceful individuality, but makes her writing accessible to a new audience, and her book not only flings open a forgotten world but also comes garnished with useful notes and maps of her extensive travels. (Good Book Guide, Fiona Lafferty)whatever view may be taken of Margery's visions, the book is extraordinarily lively and enjoyable, and gives an unparalleled glimpse of everyday life in that distant period of English history. This new translation by Anthony Bale is presented in idiomatic modern English, but aims to stay true to the style of the original, sometimes homely and familiar, sometimes high-flown and Latinate. It's wonderfully readable, and has an excellent introduction and notes. Altogether a great pleasure. (Shiny New Books, Harriet Devine)This new look at one of the most important texts of the Middle Ages will come as an eye-opener to those who believe that to live a religious life you need to be inordinately pious. (Northern Echo, Stephen Craggs)The Book of Margery Kempe is genuinely hard to put down - due to the incredible picture of medieval England it paints, and the fascinating mind of the woman who produced it. Anthony Bale's notes add a huge amount of value too, providing much needed context, and raising interesting questions about the material. (The Book Bag, Sue)Extraordinary (Peter Costello, The Irish Catholic) About the Author Anthony Bale studied at the universities of Oxford and York and at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He has published widely on various medieval topics, including Christian-Jewish relations, the poetry of Chaucer and Lydgate, religion in East Anglia, and fifteenth-century literature and pilgrimage. He is the editor of Mandeville's Book of Marvels and Travels in OWC, and in 2011 was awarded the Philip Leverhulme Prize.
F**N
Very good
A great insight into a medieval life
A**T
THIS WAS ONE WOMAN
A NICE PRODUCTION OF THIS EXTRAORDINARY MEDIEVAL BIOGRAPHY.
A**R
Five Stars
Exceptional book and a great companion to the book I'd ordered about St julien of Norwich
E**A
Five Stars
Excellent product and service.
R**A
A 2015 edition of an extraordinary medieval text
This is an extraordinary book is so many ways: Kempe was a fifteenth century woman who becomes a mystic, having religious visions, not dissimilar, in some ways, to Joan of Arc who was her contemporary. Living in what is now King's Lynn, Norfolk, she travelled on pilgrimage to Rome and Jerusalem, and gives us an insight into her medieval world.One of the things about Kempe is that she was always very disruptive, no silent meditations for her: instead she cried and made much noise when in the throes of what were very boisterous visions, and so annoyed many of the people around her.Her book has rather simplistically been described as the first autobiography in English but it's far more complex than that. For a start, Kempe couldn't write (as was common for the non-aristocratic of the time) and so the text is a collaborative artefact. Scholars still debate exactly what role Kempe might have played in the authorship of this text: certainly it is written in the 3rd person with Kempe herself described as 'that creature'.The translation by Bale is very well done, and his introduction and notes are helpful and concise: perhaps too concise. This is probably a publisher issue but given the questions this text poses, it might have been helpful to have a longer introduction to tease out some of the contemporary approaches to the work. The bibliography is modern and up-to-date, though (2015), which is useful.So this is fascinating for all kinds of reasons, not least as an early example of women's 'writing'. A good edition for students and general readers.
P**N
All right for some.
I found this very hard going and I must say, a little boring.
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