The study of Late Medieval English devotional and mystical literature is not only alive and well but may be said to have reached a new stage in Steven Rozenski's Wisdom's Journey. Building on a wide range of detailed studies of the relation between the mystical literature of Continental Europe and of England in the period ca. 1350–1650, Rozenski's book, which he describes as “social history of religious literature” (209), shows how much the large body of devotional texts produced in England during this period illustrates not only the vitality of the interactions between England and the Continent, but also how English works—often translations of Continental texts from both the vernacular and Latin—cannot be dismissed as derivative and second-rate; rather, they are often of considerable importance for the history of Christian mysticism and our understanding of literature in the broad sense.
Translations, particularly the selective versions made in the Late Middle Ages, have often been dismissed as worthy of only philological interest. A major aspect of Rozenki's argument is to insist that “these texts contribute to an understanding of the crucial role of translation in shaping the theological discourse in English across the divide of the Reformation” (80). Translation in the medieval period was never just verbal transposition but was always interpretive and often creative of new possibilities. Rozenski's emphasis on the role of translation is part of his wider thesis about what he calls the “mobility” of the Late Middle Age (7–13), a diffuse term that embraces not only the textual mobility of translation but also spiritual and devotional mobility displayed in some of his authors (e.g., Henry Suso, especially in his Horologium Sapientiae, and Richard Rolle), as well as the gender mobility present in many mystical texts. “Mobility” is a helpful metaphor for describing many characteristics of Late Medieval spirituality, though one in need of further analysis in relation to such questions as: (1) What constitutes “mobility” as a category?; and (2) What ties together the different versions of “mobility”?
Some of what Rozenski has to say about the mobility of the interactions between England and the Continent in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries has been noted before, as he is the first to admit. The signal contribution of his book is to bring together many detailed studies into a synthetic presentation and (more importantly) to move the discussion to a more penetrating level, based on a wider presentation of the many sources. Some of his new material involves what may be called “expanding the canon,” that is, looking at examples of the interaction between the Continent and Europe thus far neglected in all but specialized literature. This is a major contribution of Chapters 2, 3, and 4, which present new research respectively on “Henry Suso in England,” “Catherine of Siena in Trans-Reformation in England,” and “Thomas à Kempis and The Imitation of Christ,” a study of how the Imitation led to the birth of what Rozenski calls, “confessional textual criticism.” There is much to learn from these chapters, especially Chapter 3. Chapter 1, “Devotional Mobility in Fourteenth-Century England and Germany,” repays special attention for raising questions of general interest to all students of later medieval religion and spirituality.
This chapter is a detailed study of two of the premier mystics of the fourteenth century: the German Dominican Henry Suso (ca. 1295–1360) and the English hermit, Richard Rolle (1298–1348). These two mystics have at times been considered together, but never to the depth found in Wisdom’ Journey. Let me single out a few of the central motifs where Wisdom's Journey provides new insights into Suso and Rolle. First, Suso and Rolle are examples of male mystics who were not only visionaries but also profoundly somatic in their approach to the search for God. Their popularity puts the lie to claims that visions and embodied mysticism are primarily the domain of women. Second, both the German and the Englishman wrote in Latin and in their respective vernaculars. This form of “mystical conversation,” initiated by Meister Eckhart, Suso's teacher, was of considerable, and still not fully studied, importance for the transition of mysticism from an elite clerical phenomenon to a wider audience. Further, Suso and Rolle are also prime examples of medieval “self-fashioning,” that is, the use of pseudo-autobiography and constructed authority to illustrate key devotional themes and practices. Among the practices advocated by these “exemplary figures” are erotic themes most often associated with female authors, as well as highly somatic devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus. Such concerns show how both the Dominican and the hermit are prime examples of the gender malleability typical of many mystics, especially in the Late Middle Ages (see 43–48). Finally, Suso and Rolle have distinctive devotions to song and music in the mystical path. As Rozenski summarizes, “the specifically experiential modality of the aural and musical is at the heart of their understanding of the ascent to divine union” (77).
Rozenski's fine book fulfills its claim that focusing on “aurality, gender, and translation across regions and across time periods” (212) provides new insight into many aspects of Late Medieval and Early Modern mysticism.
