Articulating ecstasy : image and allegory in The booke of gostlye grace of Mechtild of Hackeborn
Date
1990
Authors
Voaden, Rosalynn Jean
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Abstract
The Booke of Gostlye Grace of Mechtild of Hackeborn is the Middle English translation of the Liber specialis gratiae, a compilation in Latin of accounts of the visions of Mechtild of Hackeborn, a nun at the convent of Helfta in the last half of the thirteenth century . It is an intriguing example of medieval women's visionary writing which has been largely ignored by scholars. The Booke of Gostlye Grace is notable for its unusual mode of visionary expression; each visionary or mystic has to develop her or his own language to attempt to convey experiences of ecstasy . Mechtild of Hackeborn' s unique language emerges as an original combination of image and allegory. She materializes her spiritual sensations in vivid , concrete, highly detailed images which capture the imagination and draw the reader into the visionary experience. She then formulates t hose images into complex transformational allegories - allegories in which the various elements shift or change in significance as the allegory progresses - which defy the laws of nature and so subvert the materialization of the images . The mind is then forced to reach past the concrete visualization to contemplate a transcendent reality which is beyond both logic and language.
Mechtild' s images are sensual and aesthetically pleasing; they are drawn from scripture, the liturgy, domestic life at Helfta, her own experiences, and the courtly love tradition. This thesis examines Mechtild's visionary images both as discrete entities and as elements of the allegories which contain them. It defines and categorizes the various types of allegory in The Booke of Gostlye Grace, and analyzes the interplay between image and allegory in Mechtild's visionary accounts. The thesis is structured around four groups of images: those deriving from the devotion to the Wounded Side and the Sacred Heart; those drawn from familial and domestic life; those focusing on erotic or nuptial union; and those originating in the courtly love tradition.
One of the purposes of this thesis is to direct the attention of scholars to The Booke of Gostlye Grace as a possible source for later Middle English works, both spiritual and secular. To this end, Pearl, The Book of Margery Kempe, Piers Plowman, A Book of Showings to the Anchoress Julian of Norwich, and Le Morte d'Arthur will be briefly examined.
It is in Mechtild's startling inconsistencies between image and allegory in The Booke Of Gostlye Grace that can be perceived the spiritual truths about the nature of God's love that she sought to express. Her accounts materialize the essence of her ecstatic experiences in vivid, sensual images; she formulates these into engrossing, unpredictable transformational allegories whose defiance of natural laws gives promise of a realm of transcendent order. The Book of Gostlye Grace is a rich and vibrant tapestry of image and allegory, sensuality and spirituality, which repays further study.