Wisdom's Journey: Continental Mysticism and Popular Devotion in England, 1350–1650

Postmedieval categories used to classify texts often create silos in which certain works are seldom placed in conversation with others, and at worst are entirely ignored. Popular secular texts are often seen as completely separate from literature by ecclesiastical authors, regardless of whether or not that latter group of texts influenced their nonreligious counterparts or even if their popularity eclipsed those works in previous centuries. Steven Rozenski's Wisdom's Journey, however, reconsiders these traditional categories in order to “reinvigorate our understanding of popular piety and its most popular literary manifestations” in the period between 1350 and 1650 (p. 3). Rozenski refocuses attention on the adaptations and translations of devotional and mystical texts that were a central feature of the late medieval and Early Modern literary marketplace. To gather together discussions of the movement of authors across physical, spiritual, and linguistic boundaries as well as of texts’ circulation throughout Europe, translation into new languages, and adaptations to suit local devotional cultures, Rozenski coins the term “devotional mobility” (p. 8). His study thus intends to recalibrate our approach to medieval literature by shifting attention away from texts linked to specific national traditions and works by single authors towards a greater emphasis on popular literature consumed by an international readership. To that end, the book progresses through significant instances of devotional mobility in texts by or dependent upon the work of Richard Rolle, Henry Suso, Catherine of Siena, and Thomas à Kempis.Innovative contemplative writings by the English hermit Richard Rolle and the Swabian Dominican Henry Suso are placed next to one another in the first chapter, as Rozenski identifies devotional priorities shared by both authors. Although Rolle and Suso are idiosyncratic in their own national contexts, each share several traits, such as a high proficiency with vernacular and Latin authors, an awareness of the value and force of each language, a recognition of the power and efficacy of the vernacular in pastoral care, especially for women, and a sensitivity to the relationships between textuality, aurality, and the mystical experience. Rozenski also calls attention to each author's malleable performance of gender as their narrators and Christ oscillate at times between male and female identities over the course of specific encounters. Especially valuable, however, is this chapter's discussion of Rolle's and Suso's innovations and divergences concerning each author-character's narrative voice. By reporting events in the immediate present and framing theological claims as the result of the personal experience of a single author-character, Rolle and Suso depart from popular contemplative works such as Pseudo-Bonaventure's Meditationes, Ludolph of Saxony's Vita Christi, the Vitae Patrum, the Legenda Aurea, and the Speculum Vitae. This narrative strategy allows Rolle and Suso to sidestep contemporary doctrinal controversies and, more important for Rozenski's argument, focus instead on the author-character's encounter with God. Rozenski pays careful attention throughout the chapter to the convergences of these authors’ devotional priorities and their representation of the contemplative experience. Discrete discussions within the chapter frame these authors’ approach to femininity and devotion, the gendering of the soul, bridal mysticism, a synesthetic understanding of mystical encounter, the Holy Name, and an emphasis on aurality as indicative of their shared predilection for apophatic contemplation.Chapter two explores the extensive influence of Suso on English religious writers for more than 250 years. It is well known that Suso's Seven Points of True Love and Everlasting Wisdom—a Middle English translation of his Horologium Sapientiae—as well as the Latin original were broadly excerpted across the English literary landscape in the fifteenth century. In making a case for the significance of Suso's contribution, Rozenski identifies three signposts of the Dominican's theological and literary influence: a changing model of authorship characterized by a shift toward the author as exemplum; a reworking of gender dynamics in the discourse of spiritual marriage; and a reconsideration of the role of experience in the practice and exercise of contemplative literature. In an effort to correct the longstanding dismissal of Suso's importance in England, Rozenski, following Dirk Schultze, considers citations and adaptations of the Seven Points and Horologium in works ranging from Nicholas Love's Mirror of the Blessed Life of Jesus Christ to John Fisher's Spiritual Consolation and beyond. Taking readers through this series of texts—each one a demonstration of Suso's devotional mobility—Rozenski encourages readers to “recognize some of the literary power and cultural importance” of these late medieval translations of Suso's writing in new ways (p. 129).In chapter three, Rozenski explores Catherine of Siena's complicated reception in England as a “vivid illustration” of the ways in which European holy women and the texts associated with them shaped insular spiritual literature and devotional culture (p. 135). Unlike other holy women read in England, Catherine and the texts associated with her offer complex models of exemplarity that promote forms of imitatio encouraging imitation of both the author-character in the text and that character's relationship with the divinity. Rozenski calls attention to the way in which Catherine, like Suso, is refashioned by her translators and interpreters to satisfy the needs of multiple English readerships by becoming an exemplar of female mystical devotion, a mother figure, a model for learned religious women, and, eventually, a symbol of Catholic resistance to the Reformation. Especially valuable, however, is Rozenski's discussion of Catherine's concern with language, the potential for harm posed by both the read and spoken word, and the nutritive value of language in prayer and scripture.The last work Rozenski considers as exemplifying phenomena grouped under the umbrella of devotional mobility is Thomas à Kempis's Imitatio Christi. Whereas earlier texts discussed in this study sought to channel readers’ imitative desire toward the author-character as a stimulus to performing the devotional life, the imitatio fostered in Kempis's work reflects the priorities of the devotio moderna by nurturing intense humility, interiorized suffering, regular private prayer, and spiritual notetaking. Rozenski explores several English translations of Kempis's great work and notes the ways in which each new rendering was motivated by complex theological, political, and commercial concerns. Interrelationships between texts are well illustrated by Rozenski's placement of prefaces that headed each new translation along a continuum and in conversation with one another, beginning with the 1531 printed edition attributed to the Birgittine priest-brother Richard Whitford and continuing on to Edward Hake's 1568 and Thomas Rogers's 1580 post-Reformation translations. We see, for example, Rogers's disapproval of Hake's insufficiently de-Catholicized translation. Rogers not only expunges any Catholic elements from his text but applies, Rozenski argues, the first instance of confessional textual criticism in English translations of Kempis.Wisdom's Journey is an impressive effort aimed at reconfiguring contemporary discussions of devotional literature whose popularity equaled or even eclipsed that of other works which have enjoyed a traditionally privileged position within the canon. Each chapter's arguments encompass significant amounts of scholarship, some of which are, at times, tangential; however, the scope of this book is capacious and gathers together rich material for scholars wishing to step outside traditional frameworks of studying literature by considering the text's movement across national, linguistic, cultural, and confessional frontiers.

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