Abstract:
Mary Magdalene and the Virgin Mary continue to intrigue and fascinate us to this day. Their appearances in the Bible are brief, piquing our curiosity and compelling speculation about the unknown years of their lives. This volume contains modern translations of plays performed during the late Middle Ages in England about the lives of the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene. These plays provide a link between canonical Scripture, apocryphal and gnostic materials from the first centuries of Christianity that survived secreted or in oral tradition, legendary materials that developed over the ensuing centuries, and contemporary medieval religious belief and practices.
Materials from the N-Town Mary and other plays contain episodes about the childhood of the Virgin, her betrothal and marriage to Joseph, and her time after the death of Christ. The Digby Mary Magdalene begins with an account of the death of Mary Magdalene’s father’s death, her subsequent fall into promiscuity, her redemption, her journey to convert Marseille and thus christianize France, her later years as a hermit and her death. These plays illustrate one way in which Biblical materials were available to lay people before the printing of the Bible. Reading these plays of the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene from the late Middle Ages increases our understanding of the history of the Marian and Magdalene traditions practiced in earlier centuries, as well as our understanding of what these women have come to represent today, shedding light on how their images have shaped the roles for women in the Church.
Contents
Introduction
Women in Early Christianity and the Middle Ages
The Reputation of the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene in the Middle Ages
Vernacular Religion
Middle English Biblically Based Drama
Why these plays and what are their origins?
Historical and Contemporary Issues
Conclusion
A note on the modernized translation
The N-Town Mary Play and Marion materials
Joachim and Anne
The Presentation of Mary in the Temple
The Marriage of Mary and Joseph
The Parliament of Heaven, Salutation & Conception
Joseph’s Doubt
Visit to Elizabeth
The Trial of Mary and Joseph
The Nativity
The Purification
The Appearance to Mary
The Assumption of Mary
The Digby Mary Magdalene
Bibliography
Prof.
Colleen E. Donnelly
Colleen Donnelly is an associate professor at the University of Colorado at Denver. She received her Ph.D. From the University of Washington. She previously published Linguistics for Writers (SUNY UP) and has published articles primarily on medieval literature and medieval women, Biblical and gnostic influences on later literature, as well as Faulkner, Barthes, and Milton.
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