Margery Kempe and Her World

by Anthony Goodman

Daughter of a mayor of King's Lynn, wife of a burgess there and mother of fourteen children, Margery Kempe (c. 1373-post 1438) was also a religious mystic and hysteric, who dictated her 'autobiography' to a scribe at the end of her life. In this history of her life, Anthony Goodman examines "The Book", to reconstruct as much of her conventional biography as the materials allow.  Including her spiritual experiences, but focusing most particularly on her day-to-day life, he builds an intriguing picture of bourgeois society in late medieval Lynn, and the wider world of late medieval towns in England and Europe more generally.

Genres: Biography, Medieval, Nonfiction, History

304 pages, Paperback

First published September 18, 2002

About the author

Anthony Goodman (1936-2016) was an English professor emeritus of medieval and renaissance history at the University of Edinburgh. His main field of interest was late medieval England, and he published books on subjects such as John of Gaunt and the Wars of the Roses.

See also Anthony A. Goodman for the author of The Shadow of God