Book Section
Johannes Wolf
Unlikely Matter
The Open and the Nomad in The Book of Margery Kempe and the Middle English Christina Mirabilis
In The Book of Margery Kempe, the protagonist shifts between identities and geographies as a nomadic subject, dispersed across compassionate responses to violence that unusually include a recognition of animal suffering. The Life of Christina the Astonishing also seizes on the nonhuman aspects of extreme affective experience as her bodily transformations participate in a process of becoming-animal. Both texts reflect a medieval fascination with the devotional body as a zone of closure and opening where transhuman and interspecies associations can be safely explored.
Keywords: Margery Kempe; Christina Mirabilis; Rosi Braidotti; animal studies; affect theory; devotional literature; spirituality
| Title |
Unlikely Matter
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| Subtitle |
The Open and the Nomad in The Book of Margery Kempe and the Middle English Christina Mirabilis
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| Author(s) |
Johannes Wolf
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| Identifier | |
| Description |
In The Book of Margery Kempe, the protagonist shifts between identities and geographies as a nomadic subject, dispersed across compassionate responses to violence that unusually include a recognition of animal suffering. The Life of Christina the Astonishing also seizes on the nonhuman aspects of extreme affective experience as her bodily transformations participate in a process of becoming-animal. Both texts reflect a medieval fascination with the devotional body as a zone of closure and opening where transhuman and interspecies associations can be safely explored.
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| Is Part Of | |
| Place |
Berlin
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| Publisher |
ICI Berlin Press
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| Date |
19 April 2022
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| Subject |
Margery Kempe
Christina Mirabilis
Rosi Braidotti
animal studies
affect theory
devotional literature
spirituality
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| Rights |
© by the author(s)
Except for images or otherwise noted, this publication is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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| Language |
en-GB
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| page start |
169
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| page end |
189
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| Source |
Openness in Medieval Europe, ed. by Manuele Gragnolati and Almut Suerbaum, Cultural Inquiry, 23 (Berlin: ICI Berlin Press, 2022), pp. 169–89
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References
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Cite as:
Johannes Wolf, ‘Unlikely Matter: The Open and the Nomad in The Book of Margery Kempe and the Middle English Christina Mirabilis’, in Openness in Medieval Europe, ed. by Manuele Gragnolati and Almut Suerbaum, Cultural Inquiry, 23 (Berlin: ICI Berlin Press, 2022), pp. 169-89 <https://doi.org/10.37050/ci-23_09>