Middle English devotional compilations – consisting of a series of texts or extracts of texts that have intentionally been put together to constitute new and unified devotional texts – have often been approached as complex collections of source texts that need to be linked with their originals. This book argues that the study of compilations should move beyond the disentanglement of their sources. It approaches compiling as a literary activity and an active way of shaping the medieval text, with the aim to nuance scholarly discussion about compiling by putting greater emphasis on the literary instead of the technical aspects of compiling activity. In addition to describing the additions, omissions and other types of adaptations that compilers made to their source texts, Middle English Devotional Compilations highlights the nature and function of compiling activity in late medieval England, and examines three major but understudied Middle English devotional compilations in depth: The Pore Caitif, The Tretyse of Love and A Talkyng of the Love of God.

This volume considers texts that are defined as devotional compilations. A compilation consists of a series of texts or extracts of texts that have intentionally been put together to constitute a new single and unified text. The focus is primarily on devotional compilations, but the volume includes discussions of pastoral compilations as well. The texts considered here are works that invite readers to develop a personal relationship with the divine at a fairly advanced personal level. An exploration of devotional compilations allows a more sophisticated understanding of authorial roles, reading practices and patronage among religious and secular individuals and communities. In this volume, leading scholars in the field of medieval English literature consider the role and impact of a substantial corpus of devotional compilations. Their work yields groundbreaking evidence on devotional compilations and the manuscripts in which they occur. It provides new information on the way compilations are designed, on the literary role of compilers and the authorial strategies they use, on patronage, book ownership, readership, reading communities and reception, as well as on manuscript contexts and affinities with other texts.

A new reading of the Revelations in the context of late-medieval manuscript traditions. Compilation and miscellany manuscripts were widely owned in the late middle ages, by both the laity and the clergy. Here, their possible influence on Julian of Norwich's Revelations is explored. The book argues that formalfeatures of compilation are evident in the text, deployed by Julian to give authority and didactic force to the theological debate in which she is engaged. Combining study of compilation manuscripts and manuscripts of the Revelations with structural analysis, it suggests important new ways of reading the Revelations, and makes a strong case for compilation as a literary form with creative potential. Dr ELISABETH DUTTON is Senior Research Fellow, Worcester College, University of Oxford.

The book offers a new perspective on late medieval compiling activity. Additionally, it offers a more nuanced perspective on late medieval religious culture in England. Lastly, it examines three major, but understudied Middle English texts in depth: the Pore Caitif, The Tretyse of Love and A Talkyng of the Love of God.

Essays exploring the great religious and devotional works of the Middle Ages in their manuscript and other contexts.

Recent scholarship on the Middle Ages has highlighted the importance of individualistic tendencies in devotion in both the lay world and religious communities. This interaction between individualization and religious agency has been scrutinized in numerous studies, focusing on the beginnings during the so-called 'Twelfth-Century Renaissance', and further development in the later medieval and early modern periods. However, there has hitherto been relatively little scholarship on the phenomenon in the Devotio Moderna: the flourishing of more personalized forms of devotion in north-western Europe during the later Middle Ages. The essays in this volume redress this gap by exploring the processes of inwardness and the emergent individualization of religious practices in the late medieval Low Countries. The essays explore issues including the early impact of the printing press on devotion; meditational aids such as identification with Christ, prayer cycles, practices of remembrance, and devout songs; and the tension between inner devotion and the ideal of communal piety in male and female religious communities. They also discuss some leading individuals of the Devotio movement. By addressing the Devotio Moderna and its contexts - the emergence of inwardness, individualization, and religious agency in the late medieval Low Countries and surrounding areas - the essays in this volume help to enhance and expand our knowledge of devotion in the late Middle Ages, both in lay circles and in religious communities, and they show the distinct contribution of the Low Countries to the European phenomenon of more personalized forms of devotion.

The medieval north of England has been underexplored to date, and this volume may be seen as an invitation for further exploration. It brings together scholars with shared interests in language, literature, culture, history and manuscript studies, viewed from different disciplinary perspectives such as English philology, historical linguistics and medieval literature. While many scholars have thus far been debating the dividing lines between north and south as well as between north, Midlands and south, the contributors to this volume are interested in texts produced in the north, the providence of which has been determined by way of affiliation to religious and civic writing centres including the important monastic houses in the north (such as Durham, York and the Yorkshire Cistercian houses). Most of the contributions grow out of recent and ongoing research projects that touch upon different aspects of the north of England in the medieval period. Concentrating on the north as a centre of manuscript production, dissemination and reception, this volume aims also at illustrating the fluidity of boundaries and communication, and the resulting links to different geographical regions.