Anchorites, Wombs, and Tombs: Intersections of Gender and Enclosure in the Middle Ages (Religion & Culture in the Middle Ages) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 070832200X ISBN 13: 9780708322000

Publisher: University of Wales Press, 2010

Synopsis

Until recently, the figure of the medieval anchorite and the underlying ideological concepts that framed her day-to-day existence have escaped detailed examination, despite the anchorite’s importance to the study of medieval culture. This collection brings together leading scholars in the field of gender and anchoritic studies in order to examine anchoritic enclosure from a variety of different perspectives. In so doing, Anchorites, Wombs, and Tombs offers illuminating conclusions about how the phenomenon of anchoritism was affected by, and in turn, influenced contemporary notions of gender difference.

About this title

About the Author

Liz Herbert McAvoy is Lecturer in Gender in English Studies at the University of Wales Swansea. She has published widely on medieval women’s writing, the medieval mystical experience and anchoritism, including a monograph on Margery Kempe and Julian of Norwich. She is currently writing a book on constructions of gender in anchoritic guidance texts.

Mari Hughes-Edwards is Lecturer in English at the University of Salford. She has recently been awarded a Ph.D. on contemplative models in high and late medieval anchoritic guidance texts which she is currently revising for publication. Other research interests include the constructions of gender and space in contemporary women’s poetry, on which she has also published a number of articles.

Review

“With its broad chronological range, extending from the ninth century to the fifteenth, and its extensive specialist variety, this is a collection more likely to be cherry-picked than consistently worked through, but that does not detract from the value of the individual essays.” –R. N. Swanson, University of Birmingham (R.N. Swanson)

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Wales Press
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 070832200X
• ISBN 13: 9780708322000
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256
• Editor: McAvoy Liz Herbert, Hughes-Edwards Mari