Mary Sharratt, author, writes:

Julian of Norwich and her contemporary Margery Kempe were mystics and literary pioneers who were nearly erased from history. Their iconic books, Julian’s Revelations of Divine Love, the first book in English written by a woman, and Margery’s The Book of Margery Kempe, the first autobiography in the English language, languished in obscurity for centuries and only resurfaced in the twentieth century.

Julian and Margery’s face-to-face encounter in 1413, immortalized in The Book of Margery Kempe, is a fascinating glimpse into medieval sisterhood and solidarity.

The venerable Julian of Norwich offered radical counsel to Margery Kempe, failed businesswoman and mother of fourteen, who was haunted by her visceral visions of the divine.

With Julian’s blessing, Margery walked away from a soul-destroying marriage and became a globe-trotting pilgrim-preacher and rabble rouser. Though these two women might seem like polar opposites—Julian, the enclosed anchoress, and free-roving Margery experiencing her visions in the full stream of worldly life—they complement each other. Together their lives and work form a Via Feminina, a distinctly female path to the divine.

Novelist Mary Sharratt will discuss how her research into women’s hidden histories inspired her to showcase Julian and Margery in her acclaimed novel, Revelations.

These tickets are for the Zoom link. This is not an in-person event.

We will send ticket holders the link to the recording on our YouTube channel shortly after the live stream.

The Julian650 Lecture in September

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