Piers Plowman as an Allegory Essay

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Margery Kempe and William Langland have in common an acute sense of the dysfunctionality of the late medieval Church but where Langland seeks ecclesiastical reform for the communal good, Kempe’s critique is motivated by more personal aims. Defend, refute, or qualify this statement.

It is clear from readings of Langland’s The Vision of Piers Plowman, that there is a satirical cry for ecclesiastical reform. The Book of Margery Kempe, however, doesn’t appear to disapprove of the church’s practice but instead calls for personal recognition to receive saintly status. This assignment will explore the aims of both Langland and Kempe’s works, comparing those favoring the communal good of Christian followers, with those of individualistic desires. I will begin by examining William Langland’s gripes with the catholic church that are expressed through the character of Will in Piers Plowman. These range from the monetary greed of the clergy to the gluttony and poor work ethic of the laity. I will start by discussing the prologue and examine the allegorical narrative employed by Langland. I will then move on to talk about the character of Piers the plowman and how he is used in many ways as an example of how to practice good faith. The second part of the essay will focus on The Book of Margery Kempe and the ways in which Kempe’s story is one containing an obvious cry for ecclesiastical approval rather than a general desire for the communal good. I will talk about her vivid visions of Christ’s suffering and the affective piety she employs in her spiritual meditation through her consistent and uncontrollable weeping. Then I will move on to the idea of Lollardy in relation to Kempe, exploring whether or not she could really be considered a Lollard or not and how she has been analyzed in modern studies.

Piers Plowman, it would appear, is an autobiographical account of the religious, social, and economic struggles of Will, our narrator. However, it is also an allegory, with Will being a personification of human free will and the everyday struggle to achieve salvation through knowledge, choice, and action. The Prologue sets the scene of the poem in a field between an elegant tower and a dark dungeon, or in other words, between heaven and hell, filled with people, both rich and poor:

As I biheeld into the eest an heigh to the sonne,

I seigh a tour on a toft trieliche ymaked,

A deep dale bynethe, a dongeon therinne,

With depe diches and derke and dredfulle of sighte.

A fair feeld fun of folk fond I ther bitwene—

Of alle manere of men, the meene and the riche,

Werchynge and wandrynge as the world asketh. (Prologue, lines 13-20).

Will begins to describe how members of the clergy act without moral judgment, in this valley, selling merchandise and preaching false sermons to unlearned people for payment. Langland writes about how false clerics join together with genuine bishops in a scheme to make money. This is a complete disregard for the decency of the catholic church and is an element that Langland wishes to reform in order to wholly follow God in good work and penance for one’s sins through prayer rather than through payment:

Ther preched a pardoner as he a preest were:

Broughte forth a bulk with bisshopes seles,

And seide that hymself myghte assoillen hem alle

Of falshede of fasrynge, of avowes ybroken.

Lewed men leved hym wet and liked hise wordes,

Comen up knelynge to kissen hise bulks.

He bonched hem with his brevet and blered hire eighth,

And raughte with his rageman rynges and broches.

Thus [ye] gyven [youre] gold glotons to helpe,

And leneth it losels that leccherie haunten!

Were the bisshop yblessed and worth bothe his ens,

His seel sholde noght be sent to deceyve the peple.

Ac it is noght by the bisshop that the boy precheth—

For the parisshe preest and the pardoner parten the silver

hat the povere [peple] of the parissche sholde have if they ne were. (Prologue, lines 68-82).

The abuse of ecclesiastical power is the main concern for Langland throughout the poems with Piers the Plowman acting as a representative of both men in multiple cases and also, as Christ. In Passus I, Piers is a simple plowman, an example of a perfect laborer, who pointed a thousand pilgrims in the direction of God, rejecting to reward offered to him. This would appear to represent the selfless good of the worker that society should aspire to be. This is to say as far as our interpretation of the symbol goes, that the role of Piers here in its very inception is more than that of a mere plowman. It is a symbol of a multi-fold aspect revealing multifold truth. (Troyer, 1932, pp 375). The second time Piers appears as an overseer to the workers, giving them the job of plowing before they can reach the heavenly tower. Again, there is an emphasis on the need to work hard in order to get to heaven. Although Langland was a Catholic, this foreshadows the Protestant work ethic that is to come during the Reformation in the sixteenth century, later to be explored further by the German sociologist Max Weber. Piers’ role of overseer in this passus, when some of the workers slack and are found to be eating in gluttony which results in a famine, as penance for their sins. Piers is also given power by God to absolve men from their sins. As Piers has always been presented as a good man, this could be a representation of the need for a new process of confession, one that is not governed by falsehoods like that of the prologue’s pardoner:

And when this deed was done, Do-best he thought,

And gave Piers power, and pardon he granted:

To all manner men, mercy and forgiveness; To him,

might, men to assoil of all manner sins.

absolve In covenant that they come and knowledge to pay acknowledge

To Piers the Plowman’s pardon — redde quod debes.

“Thus hath Piers power, be his pardon paid,

To bind and unbind both here and else,

And absolve men of all sins save of debt one (Passus 19, lines 183-91).

Langland, through his use of narrative, introduced a piece of work that would challenge the ideals of the church at the time. The Vision of Piers Plowman went on to inspire a new genre of writings called ‘Plowman’ poems. These poems were written by authors who were either heterodox or orthodox, showing the wide influence of Langland’s work. “Langland is essentially concerned to transform institutions, and as such he often adopts the textual (or oral) forms of those institutions, [their discourses] …The word ‘genre’ serve[s] to designate the formal characteristics of these textual forms… But in adopting genres, Langland is exploiting or questioning the authority of these genres, and, thereby, exploiting or questioning the institution from which the genre derives”. (Simpson, 1990 qt. in ENG2041 Week 7).

The Book of Margery Kempe recognized as the first autobiographical work in the English language, follows one ‘creature’s’ religious journey and conversion from a businesswoman filled with material greed to a devout mystic and pilgrim. Although Kempe’s book is very much an individualistic account of religion, it has been thought to cause local contemplation regarding the effect of private meditation over public prayer. Wilson states that “her [Margery’s] account shows her to be a socially divisive character whose behavior caused the more conservative-minded laity to attempt to suppress radical clerical belief according to their own standards of religious orthodoxy”. (Wilson, 1997, pp. 156). With this being said, it would be difficult to consider the book as being one with social or political intentions. Margery Kempe’s goals were of a personal nature, with her book appearing to be written as an effort to increase her chances of achieving a saintly reputation among Christians. “If Kempe’s stories of persecution were meant to give seal to her aspirations to saintly honor, the language in which she couched these stories, the language so strongly reminiscent of the New Testament, was meant to strengthen her case. (Powell, 2003, pp.20). Powell refers to the vivid mystic imagery used by Kempe in her story. Christ promises Kempe that she will reach heaven if she acts as a mirror for society; an example of how to achieve salvation. This is similar to Langland’s use of Piers, mentioned above. She must also pray for everybody’s sins in order to achieve this for herself:

Nevyrthelesse, dowtyr, I have ordeynd the to be a merowr amongys hem for to han

gret sorwe that thei schulde takyn exampil by the for to have sum litil sorwe in her

hertys for her synnys that thei myth therthorw be savyd, but thei lovyn not to heryn of

sorwe ne of contricyon. But, good dowtyr, do thu thi dever and prey for hem whil thu

art in this world, and thu schalt have the same mede and reward in hevyn as yyf al the

werlde wer savyd be thi good wil and thi preyer. (lines 4409-4414).

Margery’s imitation of Christ’s suffering was an attempt to save people from damnation, or so it would appear from the various times she has asked God to bring all men to salvation. However, when it comes to helping others, for example when her own husband, John is ill, she is reluctant to give her assistance, but does so regardless, as she knows it may lead her to be known as a martyr. Her mystical visions of Christ’s birth, death, and resurrection, cause her the most intense weeping, especially the moments leading up to his crucifixion, as she sees Mary, his mother suffer watching her son beaten with scourges:

An other tyme sche saw in hyr contemplacyon owr Lord Jhesu Crist bowndyn to a

peler, and hys handys wer bowndyn abovyn hys hevyd. And than sche sey sextene

men wyth sextene scorgys, and eche scorge had eight babelys of leed on the ende, and

every babyl was ful of scharp prekelys as it had ben the rowelys of a spor. And tho

men wyth the scorgys madyn comenawnt that ich of hem schulde gevyn owr Lord forty

strokys. Whan sche saw this petows syght, sche wept and cryid ryth lowde as yyf sche

schulde a brostyn for sorwe and peyne. (lines 4526-4532).

Kempe is often accused of being a Lollard by clerics she surrounded herself with and although all such charges against her are dropped, “Kempe responds to the complex gendering of Lollardy by both its adherents and opponents as a central aspect of her self-presentation as a female mystic and reformer, translating academic discourses filtered through a formidable and fascinatingly diverse host of clerical friends and advisers into a vernacular interpretation of her life”. (Shklar, 1995). Christ gives her the authority to speak up against known clerics as she has religious knowledge that they do not due to direct conversations with Him:

Drede the nowt, dowtyr, for thow schalt have the vyctory of al thin enmys.

I schal geve the grace inow to answer every clerke in the love of God. (lines 384-385).

In this way, it is easy to understand why Kempe was accused of such Lollardy throughout her spiritual journey. However, Arnold mentions an explanation given by Nancy Partner, that Kempe did not challenge the church as such, nor did she desire ecclesiastical reform, but instead simply sought approval from existing powers within the clergy. “She does not seek to defend women’s preaching but calls upon the pre-existing discourse of legitimation”. (Arnold, 2004, pp. 91-92). It is this personal desire for approval and recognition that sets Margery Kempe apart from Langland and his hopes for religious improvement for the communal good.

As stated, both Langland and Kempe demonstrate the dysfunctionality of the late medieval catholic church, however, the aims of their works differ significantly when it comes to the idea of ecclesiastical reform. William Lamgland’s Piers Plowman identifies problems such as greed, gluttony, poor work ethic, and lack of prayer, whereas Kempe speaks exclusively of her personal journey through spirituality and her experience of weeping as a means of suffering in the name of Christ. Langland inspired a large range of political and social texts and his work could be described as a leading factor for the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381. Kempe was scrutinized as a Lollard despite her ability to deny such accusations within the ecclesiastical court and although her book has become regarded as something of a fictitious piece of work, she was seen as a holy- woman by many people at the time. Langland on the other hand created a reformative rhetoric and in some ways achieved his goal: “Do Well, Do Better, Do Best”.

Bibliography

Primary Sources

Kempe, Margery. ‘The Book of Margery Kempe, trans. Anthony Bale.’ (2015)
Langland, 2006: William Langland, William’s Vision of Piers Plowman, ed. Ben ByramWigfield, London, E.E.T.S
Staley, Lynn, ed. The Book of Margery Kempe. University of Rochester, 1996.

Secondary Sources

Arnold, John H. ‘Margery’s Trials: Heresy, Lollardy, and Dissent.’ A Companion to the Book of Margery Kempe (2004): 75-93.
Kelly, Stephen. ‘Renewing the World: Piers Plowman and Reformist Writing’. Canvas. 2018. https://canvas.qub.ac.uk/courses/1154/files/70533?module_item_id=78119
Powell, Raymond A. ‘Margery Kempe: An exemplar of late medieval English piety.’ The Catholic historical review 89.1 (2003): 1-23.
Shklar, Ruth. ‘Cobham’s daughter:’The Book of Margery Kempe’and the power of heterodox thinking.’ Modern language quarterly 56.3 (1995): 277-305.
Troyer, Howard William. ‘Who is Piers Plowman?.’ Publications of the Modern Language Association of America(1932): 368-384.
Wilson, Janet. ‘Communities of Dissent: The Secular and Ecclesiastical Communities of Margery Kempe’s Book.’ Medieval women in their communities (1997): 155-85.

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Piers Plowman as an Allegory Essay

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