Skirting Heresy: an introduction to Margery Kempe

FOR LIZ MACDONALD

Hear the song here 

Margery of Lynn - author, pilgrim, mystic -

Saw things that weren't there, spoke heresy

But the Heresy She Spoke and the Things That Weren't There

Were a vision of a future reality.

The Lord Jesus spoke to her like a Song in her heart:

'Though a menace to churchmen, you’re a mystic to me,

There is none so pure as the mother who gives

This world to so many and her soul to me.

'Born before your time

It would take an eternity

To redress their abyss,

Skirting heresy.

'They would fetter your soul

With wedlock-maternity,

Apron and stain,

Skirting heresy.

'You fore-saw what the spirit

Of a woman could be

And clothed your flesh in it,

Skirting heresy.'

Margery of Lynn - author, pilgrim, mystic -

Saw things that weren't there, spoke heresy

But the Heresy She Spoke and the Things That Weren't There

Were a vision of a future reality.

The Lord Jesus spoke to her like a Song in her heart:

'Though a menace to churchmen, you’re a mystic to me,

There is none so pure as the mother who gives

This world to so many and her soul to me.

'In the arms of your soul

You may take me as boldly

As a good wife her spouse,'

Skirting heresy.

The sun of love in your heart

Burns so hot and fiercely

It scares you to life,

Skirting heresy.

'This vestment of heat 

Is the heat of the Holy.

It will burn away your sins,'

Skirting heresy.

Margery of Lynn - author, pilgrim, mystic -

Saw things that weren't there, spoke heresy

But the Heresy She Spoke and the Things That Weren't There

Were a vision of a future reality.

The Lord Jesus spoke to her like a Song in her heart:

'Though a menace to churchmen, you’re a mystic to me,

There is none so pure as the mother who gives

This world to so many and her soul to me.

Magic water, magic sky,

What land appears to be,

Shift across your vision -

Skirting heresy.

On Lynn's ebb and flow,

Dock and dreaming friary

Unravel like wool -

Skirting heresy,

As England revolts

In Plague and Lollardy,

Old habits cleave -              

Skirting heresy.

Margery of Lynn - author, pilgrim, mystic -

Saw things that weren't there, spoke heresy

But the Heresy She Spoke and the Things That Weren't There

Were a vision of a future reality.

The Lord Jesus spoke to her like a Song in her heart:

'Though a menace to churchmen, you’re a mystic to me,

There is none so pure as the mother who gives

This world to so many and her soul to me.

Your unsung fishwife Word,

Your un-nun livery,

Your Magdalene hair-shirts,

Skirting heresy,

Chat to God without a priest;

As His Mother in Galilee,

Nurse and feed Him like a Babe,

Skirting heresy,

In the dance of the Hansa,

Out of step, off the quay,

Walk on water like the sun,

Skirting heresy.

Margery of Lynn - author, pilgrim, mystic -

Saw things that weren't there, spoke heresy

But the Heresy She Spoke and the Things That Weren't There

Were a vision of a future reality.

The Lord Jesus spoke to me like a Song in my heart:

Though a menace to churchmen, you’re a mystic to me,

There is none so pure as the mother who gives

This world to so many and her soul to me.

New York playwright Liz Macdonald's play about Margery Kempe of Lynn plays Lynn Minster, Margery's own beloved parish church, on Sep 22 2018. It has 54 roles including a young Margery, an older one, England's first proto-Protestant martyr (William Sawtrey late of this parish) and King Henry IV (part 1). This is such an exciting prospect.

It also has a suite of songs for which I'm delighted to have written the lyrics. An album of these and several others about Margery's life and times has been recorded by the Penland Phezants. The lyrics of the title track of the album (which is not in the show but has a special place on the album as a tribute to the author, her title and her subject) are printed below, along with a typically captivating extract from Margery's Book and some notes about her. This song will have its premiere at a special fund-raising concert for the project as part of Heritage Day at Hanse House on Sep 16 2018.

"Our Lord also gave her another token that lasted about 16 more years and increased ever more and more, and that was a flame of fire of love - marvellously hot and delectable and very comforting, never diminishing but ever increasing, for though the weather were never so cold she felt the heart burning in her breast and at her heart, as veritably as a man would feel the material fire if he put his hand or finger into it. 

When she first felt the fire of love burning in her breast she was afraid of it, and then Our Lord answered in her mind and said, "Daughter, don’t be afraid because this heat is the heat of the Holy Ghost, which will burn away all your sins, for the fire of love quenches all sins."  (Ch. 35)…

"At last the Archbishop (of York) came into the chapel with his clerics, and he said to her abruptly "Why do you go about in white clothes? Are you a virgin?

She, kneeling before him, said, "No, sir, I am no virgin. I am a married woman."

He ordered his household to fetch a pair of fetters and said she would be fettered, for she was a false heretic, and then she said, "I am no heretic, nor shall you prove me one."

The Archbishop went away and left her standing alone. Then for a long time she said her prayers to Lord God Almighty to help her and succour her against all her enemies both spiritual and bodily, and her flesh trembled and quaked amazingly, so that she was glad to put her hands under her clothes so that it should not be noticed." (ch 52)

from "The Book of Margery Kempe", the first autobiography in English. c 1441

The Dean of Norwich Cathedral asked in 1996 was Margery Kempe mystic or menace and, like the Archbishop in 1417, concluded (with perceived Norwich bias) menace. She was born in 1373 - the year Julian of Norwich was offering her visions of certainty and comfort amidst a crisis of Faith - into a England riven with the Black Death and about to experience the Peasants' Revolt. Her birthplace Lynn had been a thriving port only since Brandon Creek re-routed the Ouse to flow out there a hundred years before but was now one of the premier ports of Hanseatic Europe. Her father John Brunham, 5 times Lynn mayor and twice MP, was its leading merchant, exporting cloth (& importing pitch, wax, timber, fish and wine) but in the 1390s, as Margery married a Lynn burgess and began her family of 14 children, the English wool industry slumped. Her traumatic first pregnancy and birth caused a mental breakdown and lifelong visions of heaven and hell. She was a great frequenter of monks and clerics, holy men and women and anchorites like the one in the cell at All Saints Church, Lynn and Mother Julian in Norwich and was much attracted to such world-renouncing people but did not join them. She had grown up as a merchant's daughter on the teeming Lynn waterfront - as a young married woman had run four Lynn (ale) pubs. After raising her family, she spent years travelling and pilgrimaging out in the world, often without the required husband's written permission or confessor's licence, incurring the wrath of archbishops and others for her holy shrieking through sermons and Masses at any mention of Jesus' suffering and for loud and sustained criticism of the church patriarchy's spiritual shortcomings. Yet she was also very soft-hearted, weeping at the sight of lepers (whom she embraced) and easily hurt by gossip and criticism, so the frequent risk she ran of being burned on a heretic's bonfire is testament to a faith well beyond her personal disposition. 

Waywood in the Gallery Sep 10 2017 - in pictures

Waywood harp ballads about Lynn heroes this Sunday 1 pm -2 pm #heritageopendays The Gallery @HanseHousekl introduced by Dr Paul Richards.

"Shouldn't you be taking off your glasses, Calway?"

The Ballad of Fanny Burney

The Ballad of Margery Kempe

The Ballad of the Backwoods Cavalier (1643)

The Ballad of William Sawtrey

The Ballad of the Brown Lady

The Ballad of Henry LeStrange (going wrong)

The Ballad of Badass King John

The Ballad of Susan Nobes

Doin different - the last waltz as the Titanic tour goes down singing in Lynn! (Hanse House 11 am, 1 pm, 3 pm)

Picture gallery by Pat Jones.

Lynn news story (trending on the Lynn news website!)

"These are songs from a book, doin different it's called

All about Norfolk heroes and heroines bold.

It's on sale over there at that Hanse House stall.

You can buy it at Waterstone's and at Jarrold's.

So we're here doin different as Norfolkers should,

Nor folk in the town singing songs from the wood.

We got Margery Kempe, Walpole, two of his kin;

Bad King John, Nelson, Cod Fishers, Sawtrey of Lynn..."

(The tour song in its final adaptation)

Where Doin different all began - on the last day and 5 years ago when composer Adrian Tebbutt (left) asked me to give him some lyrics about a Norfolk legend. The result was then sung by Roger Partridge (backside shown right!) Also pictured the lady who now sings it and lead singer on Heritage Day, Sharon Clifton.

The minstrel Lynn, lead singer of Waterline.

The Fried Pirates warm up. (and another back view of Jolly Roger)

William Sawtrey of Lynn's life or death issues with the eucharistic bread and wine. Parrish priest of St Margaret's (the parish this Hanse House performance was staged in) and a Lollard martyr he was England's first burned heretic in 1401.

The Ballad of Badass King John, a Lynn Pride rap that went down well with children and adults alike.

Lynn singing about Lynn in Lynn!

Waterline's elegant music and costume perfectly suited to the occasion

Vanessa Wood-Davies (harp) and the minstrel Lynn rest between sets. Melanie Calway and Adrian Tebbutt manage to keep them both standing.

The maestro minstrel Terry Smith

Hullo, that's a bit of added woodwind on The Ballad of Sir Robert Walpole

The composer leads Waterline in the Ballad of Turnip Townshend

It's not all work. Some folk club regulars give their verdict.

"And now - Mr Lynn himself!" I introduce Dr Paul Richards, town historian of Lynn.

    Dr Paul is fascinating as always about how folk  ballads tell the social history of the town he loves.

 Vanessa and I borrow Waterline's impressive set up for this performance of Margery Kempe music.

All right lads - we knew they weren't really tights! 

I introduce the spooky 'Ballad of the Brown lady' - our ghost ballad about Dorothy Walpole, who is said to haunt both Houghton Hall (built by Sir Robert Walpole) and Raynham Hall (built by her husband and, some believe, her murderer Turnip Townshend) (we exonerate him in this ballad and in the spooky folk video we made of this ghost story)

"I rise up like a morning star of love and faith and hope..."

(Great idea of Pat's to photograph the "holy without smoke" of William Sawtrey of Lynn's burning!)

Waterline, doin different at 11 am, 1pm and 3 pm.

The Titanic 21 gig tour goes down singing into the September sunset this Sunday,the last four gigs flagged up and flying in the EDP, The Lynn News (including a page 3) and Lynn's 'Your Local Paper.'

Here's the last one - Lynn News WOW feature here.

Nine new folk ballads telling the long and colourful history of Lynn will be performed in the Blue Room of Hanse House as part of Heritage Day this Sunday.

All have been published by Poppyland publishing in a new book called 'Doin different - new ballads from the east of England' written by Sedgeford author and director of the Room at the Hanse theatre company Gareth Calway

The 'Doin different'  collection has been touring as a musical show since the premiere at Lynn's Hanse Festival last May - taking in Ely Folk festival, Folk in a Field, Lynn's Folk in the Town, the King and Queen in Foley St London W1 and the archaeological dig in Sedgeford- and on Sunday the 21 gig tour ends where it began - at Hanse House.

Twelve Norfolk-based composers have written for the project, a score of performers have participated and four new folk bands have been formed as a result. Three of these folk bands will be on show this Sunday.

One of the aims of the book is to celebrate Norfolk's often underestimated role in British history and another is to draw attention to Lynn's amazing contribution to that.

The Fried Pirates will perform ballads about the heroic and under-sung Cod Fishers of Lynn and the Siege of Lynn in 1643. Lovehearts & Redwine will offer homages to Lynn's religious pioneers Margery Kempe, who wrote the first autobiography in English, and William Sawtrey, parish priest of St Margaret's, the first man to be burned for his beliefs in England. And to not so Bad King John, who gave the port its first independence from Norwich. Waterline will sing the praises of Lynn's MP for 40 years - Sir Robert Walpole, Britain's first prime minister - and of Lynn author Fanny Burney, the mother of the Jane Austen novel.  

Waterline will also take your breath away with an exquisitely sung ghost ballad about Walpole's sister, the Brown Lady, who is said to haunt Walpole's magnificent Houghton Hall, and the Fried Pirates will add a stirring shanty about Nelson, who said Norfolk volunteers were worth two of other men and whose crews included plenty of Lynn's sea-hardened men.

All three bands perform at 11 pm and 1 pm and will be introduced at 1pm by Dr Paul Richards, town historian. At 3 pm, Lovehearts & Redwine and Waterline will perform slightly longer sets from Doin different. The Fried Pirates will perform a different set at True's yard  from 2pm-3.30pm. Admission is free for all events.

'Doin different - new ballads from the east of England' (lyrics with musical scores, photographs and historical support) is on sale at Waterstones, True's Yard, Jarrolds and Hanse House or via www.poppyland.co.uk. You can find online links to audio and video performances of songs, scores and extensive historical resources and features at www.garethcalway.co.uk

The Fried Pirates at True's yard. They will be doin different in the Blue Room of Hanse House at 11am and 1pm 

DONE different. Tour's end and into the sunset!

Crossing off the last gig and putting Done! next to it.

Margery Kempe In Our Time

Room at the Hanse Theatre Company after their performance of 'Hanseatic Characters' at the 2016 Hanse Festival, which included a performance of The Ballad of Margery Kempe (the 4 involved on that song are, from l to r - Melanie Calway, vocal; Vanessa Wood-Davies, harp; Father William Sawtrey aka Gareth Calway, lyrics; Anto Morra music, guitar, production)

This Thursday morning, June 2 2016, six centuries after,  BBC Radio 4's flagship culture  programme 'In Our Time' considers the contribution made by a Lynn housewife to the history of ideas.

'Do different' is Norfolk's motto.  Margery Kempe (1373-1438) is not the first Lynner to have thought different. Her parish priest William Sawtrey, a Lollard heretic, was the first man burned for his beliefs in England (in 1401) and has even been identified as the 'morning star' - the pioneer (for good or ill) - of the English Reformation. Lynn-raised Fanny Burney changed the course of the English novel. There is even 'compelling evidence' that the father of English poetry, Geoffrey Chaucer, was born in Lynn. It is only Norfolk's self- deprecation that stops us trumpeting all this as other regions might.

But Margery is surely the most unusual pioneer of them all.  Illiterate, she 'wrote' (by dictation) the first autobiography in English, 'The Book of Margery Kempe'. And an extraordinary book it is.

She includes details of the mediaeval world she lived in - the thriving Hanseatic waterfront of that premier league port Bishop's Lynn - and of her life in it as a Lynn burgess's wife and mother of 14 children. A recent letter to her by her son found in Danzig (now Gdansk) corroborates her book's historical accuracy. She also mentions that she was the daughter of John Brunham, the town's leading merchant, MP, mayor, benefactor, royal agent , a major player in the precarious European trade politics of the time.

But none of this interests her much. Her Book is mostly about the visions she received - first of devils, then of a beautiful loving Jesus - after her first traumatic labour. From that point on, her life was fraught with danger.

As a mediaeval woman, she was supposed to serve her husband and, as a lay person, to defer to the church. Her claims to divine visions of Jesus, of a loving God; a virgin Mary and a robin redbreast singing merrily in her right ear (which she believed was the holy ghost) - defied all conventions.

To the authorities she was either a would-be saint - which her married status prohibited and her not being a virgin called into question - or possessed of the devil. She was accused of, and tried for, the Lollard heresy, for which her parish priest was burnt in 1401, by powerful enemies like the Archbishop of York - whose steward she accused of sexual assault - and the Mayor of Leicester. Some believe it was only her position as the daughter of Lynn's rich and powerful mayor that saved her.

But other holy voices, like Mother Julian of Norwich (whom she met) and minor clerics like the Vicar of Sedgeford and Alan of Lynn, supported her claims. One of these minor clerics helped her record her visions as her scribe, which established herself as part of the mystical tradition of the fifteenth century. And a figure of increasing interest - in our time.

The lyric of The Ballad of Margery Kempe is on sale in Waterstones, Jarrold's, True's Yard Museum, Hanse House and via the publisher in 'Doin different, new ballads from the east of England', (Poppyland publishing, 2015) 

Links:

How The Lynn News covered this story - here

Portal to The Wife of Lynn's Tale (2015 Lynn Festival Fringe production) and a wealth of support material -  - here

Margery Kempe ballad in the book 'Doin different - new ballads from the east of England' (scroll down to Margery in the list of ballads and in the list of historical support  (published features etc) - here