The Digby Play of Mary Magdalene, ed. Chester N. Scoville. Peterborough, Ont.: Broadview Press, 2018, 113 pp., 2 b/w ill.

Abstract

Not surprisingly, the late medieval Digby Play of Mary Magdalene offers itself as an ideal text for an advanced university class on late medieval English literature, being an extraordinary literary mirror of the biblical figure of Mary Magdalene and her historical context, with numerous tyrant figures appearing on the stage and exposing their own hypocrisy and hubris in contrast to the main protagonist, apart from Jesus, of course. Numerous figures appear on the stage, engaging with Mary Magdalene, such as knights, heathen priests, a Jew, Pilate, a messenger, Herod, a provost, the emperor, the archangel Raphael, etc. The play was composed between 1515 and 1525, and despite the late date still fully fits into the Middle Ages, considering its religious framework and mental-historical character, even though the language is already far removed from that used by Chaucer. Nevertheless, the playwright expected a vast amount of highly challenging stage work to happen, including a ship traveling <?page nr="484"?>around or a temple to come crushing down, which indicates major cultural changes on their way.