dc.contributor.author |
Carter, Susan |
en |
dc.date.accessioned |
2011-11-20T22:29:37Z |
en |
dc.date.issued |
2009 |
en |
dc.identifier.citation |
Studies in Philology 106(4):402-419 2009 |
en |
dc.identifier.issn |
0039-3738 |
en |
dc.identifier.uri |
http://hdl.handle.net/2292/9468 |
en |
dc.description.abstract |
The Digby play, performed in a period when women were excluded from preaching, celebrates Mary Magdalene as a most successful preacher. 2 It is not a marginal work: this is a large play which takes over three hours to perform, has a cast of over 60, and thus would need at least 100 people to produce. 3 The play is highly entertaining, with stage mechanics, song, and dangerous-sounding pyrotechnics. With impressive spectacle the play shows the Magdalene as the apostola apostolorum: a woman who out-apostles the apostles. 4 There is a challenging irony in the situation of a woman preaching before a medieval audience, as Theresa Coletti shows and investigates. Coletti, noting that "discourses of female vice and virtue are deeply implicated in visions of social order, hierarchy, and control," 5 examines the historical East Anglian context of the Digby Mary Magdalen more fully in her book, Mary Magdalene and the Drama of Saints. I want to add to Coletti's anatomization of the play further evidence of its feminine perspective. Agreeing that "Medieval dramatic performance can no longer be construed as unreflective vehicles of instruction in a timeless Christian faith," 6 I examine the way that the Digby play heightens Magdalene's transgression of gender roles. In line with non-biblical material it amalgamates several episodes now considered not to belong to the Magdalene but to other women. 7 Consistently, dramatic strategies endorse the Magdalene's social transgressions: her open sexuality and her preaching. There are male foils to female |
en |
dc.language |
EN |
en |
dc.publisher |
university of north carolina press |
en |
dc.relation.ispartofseries |
Studies in Philology |
en |
dc.rights |
Items in ResearchSpace are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated. Previously published items are made available in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher. Details obtained from
http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/issn/0039-3738/ |
en |
dc.rights.uri |
https://researchspace.auckland.ac.nz/docs/uoa-docs/rights.htm |
en |
dc.title |
The Digby Mary Magdalen: Constructing the apostola apostalorum |
en |
dc.type |
Journal Article |
en |
dc.identifier.doi |
10.1353/sip.0.0040 |
en |
pubs.issue |
4 |
en |
pubs.begin-page |
402 |
en |
pubs.volume |
106 |
en |
dc.rights.holder |
Copyright: 2009 The University of North Carolina Press |
en |
pubs.end-page |
419 |
en |
dc.rights.accessrights |
http://purl.org/eprint/accessRights/RestrictedAccess |
en |
pubs.subtype |
Article |
en |
pubs.elements-id |
98916 |
en |
pubs.org-id |
Education and Social Work |
en |
pubs.org-id |
Centre for Learning and Research in Higher Education |
en |
pubs.record-created-at-source-date |
2010-09-01 |
en |