Versions of virginity in late medieval England

Sarah Salih

"Virginity is imagined by theological writers as perfect and timeless, yet as performed by individual persons, it is inherently imperfect and contingent. The legends of virgin martyrs imagine a virginity which is produced in the endurance of public torture; the torture scenes, often read as pornographic, instead highlight the contested status of the virgin body. Virginity is contained and feminised in the lives of nuns, produced communally with reference to such symbolic practices as veiling and enclosure. Margery Kempe, when read in the context of virginity theory, can claim at least to be like a virgin; if virginity is performative, she may indeed be its paradigm. Finally, virginity is the very opposite of stable and natural; it is active, contested, vulnerable but also recoupable."--BOOK JACKET.

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