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The Mystical Utterance and the Metaphorical Mode in the Writings of Marguerite D'oingt and Marguerite Porete

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The Mystical Utterance and the Metaphorical Mode in the Writings of Marguerite D'oingt and Marguerite Porete Durham E-Theses The Mystical Utterance and the Metaphorical Mode in the Writings of Marguerite d'Oingt and Marguerite Porete MATTHEWS, RACHAEL,VICTORIA How to cite: MATTHEWS, RACHAEL,VICTORIA (2014) The Mystical Utterance and the Metaphorical Mode in the Writings of Marguerite d'Oingt and Marguerite Porete , Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/10613/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 RACHAEL VICTORIA MATTHEWS THE MYSTICAL UTTERANCE AND THE METAPHORICAL MODE IN THE WRITINGS OF MARGUERITE D’OINGT AND MARGUERITE PORETE The shared conceptual underpinnings of contemporary metaphor theory and Christian mystical expression form the basis of this study of the works of two very different fourteenth-century French mystics, Marguerite d’Oingt (c.1240-1310) and Marguerite Porete (d.1310). The former, a Carthusian prioress, wrote a series of vivid visionary narratives, the Pagina meditationum, the Speculum, and Li via de Seiti Biatrix, but, to date, has been the subject of little scholarly attention. The latter, meanwhile, is perhaps best known for her condemnation for relapsed heresy and her death at the stake in Paris, on account of her radical mystical text, the Mirouer des simples ames. These two women’s writings present very different examples of late medieval mystical expression. Nevertheless, the two are intimately connected in the sense that both oeuvres are driven by a desire to express their respective experiences of the mystical presence of God. What precisely is meant by ‘mystical experience’ constitutes this mode of expression’s fundamental paradox: by its very definition, the perfection of divine encounter lies beyond the scope of human communication. Metaphor’s capacity for (partial) revelation in circumstances where other modes of communication fail, however, suggests that when applied as a hermeneutic device, theoretical perspectives of metaphor provide a fresh interpretative framework with which to explore the more enigmatic aspects of mystical thought. Drawing on a number of modern theoretical approaches, including those of Paul Ricoeur, George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, and Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner, this investigation explores the extent to which metaphor’s conceptual and cognitive underpinnings engage with, and potentially unlock, the sensitivities of Marguerite d’Oingt’s and Marguerite Porete’s post-experiential accounts of mystical phenomena. To this end, metaphor may be seen to represent mysticism’s cognitive analogue, a means of effecting linguistic and cognitive transformation impossible to express through literal language alone. THE MYSTICAL UTTERANCE AND THE METAPHORICAL MODE IN THE WRITINGS OF MARGUERITE D’OINGT AND MARGUERITE PORETE RACHAEL VICTORIA MATTHEWS PHD SCHOOL OF MODERN LANGUAGES AND CULTURES AND THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH STUDIES DURHAM UNIVERSITY 2014 TABLE OF CONTENTS Statement of Copyright 4 Acknowledgments 5 Introduction 7 Chapter One The Metaphorical Utterance and the Mystical Mode: Caught Between Experience and Expression 47 Chapter Two Texts and Contexts: The Carthusian Prioress and the pseudo mulier 88 Chapter Three The Writings of Marguerite d’Oingt: Metaphors of Codices and Corporeity 126 Chapter Four Metaphors To Imagine By: Metaphorical Annihilation in Marguerite Porete’s Mirouer des simples ames 170 Chapter Five Making the Ineffable Intelligible: The Image and the Imagination in Mystical Metaphor 218 Conclusion 261 Bibliography 271 Statement of Copyright “The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. No quotation from it should be published without the author's prior written consent and information derived from it should be acknowledged.” 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis has spent a long time in gestation, and all too short a time in writing. I am indebted to a number of people and organisations for their help and guidance over the duration of the project: to Professor David Cowling (School of Modern Languages and Cultures) and to Professor Corinne Saunders (Department of English Studies) for taking the project on, for their academic expertise and supervision, and for always making enough time. Second, my thanks goes to the Institute of Medieval and Early Modern Studies (IMEMS) at Durham for providing me with a spiritual home as it were – a place to share ideas and to feel part of a community during the singular exercise of doctoral study. It has been a privilege to have been part of the postgraduate community at Durham. The convivial surroundings of both the Middle Common Room and the Senior Common Room in University College have been a setting of much light relief, and my thanks to them for all the fun. Further afield, the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto, has welcomed me on more than one occasion and made my academic efforts all the more enjoyable and richer for it. Oslo University Library deserves a special mention here, as does the Deichmann Bibliotek; these two locations frame the scope of this project’s life. I have also been grateful for the financial assistance of several bodies over the course of my postgraduate study. The Arts and Humanities Research Council generously sponsored my work at MA-level, whilst Durham University made me the proud recipient of a Doctoral Fellowship. My thanks must also go to IMEMS and to my college for providing me with travel funds to 5 attend conferences in North America – a highlight of my time as a scholar and the source of many happy memories. This study owes much to my parents, for their unwavering support and patience. Finally, my thanks must go to Giles, without whose steady encouragement to pick up the (metaphorical) pen and write, this thesis would have remained caught in a web of ineffable thought. 6 INTRODUCTION ‘Metaphor is one of our most important tools for trying to comprehend partially what cannot be apprehended totally: our feelings, aesthetic experiences, moral practices, and spiritual awareness.’1 George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s seminal work Metaphors We Live By marked a paradigm shift in the study of metaphor. This ‘cognitive turn’ radically changed how scholars approached metaphor, traditionally understood as a literary device used to portray a comparison between two disparate entities, by arguing that metaphors are principally cognitive, and only secondarily linguistic.2 Metaphorical expressions, Lakoff and Johnson propose, underpin thought and action, and by extension, structure the mind’s perception of the world and how the world relates to the mind. Their observations and resultant theoretical framework bear a striking resemblance to the ways in which scholars have sought to comprehend mankind’s articulation of divine experience. In identifying metaphor’s capacity for (partial) revelation in circumstances where other modes of communication fail, Lakoff and Johnson’s ‘cognitive metaphor theory’ bears a striking resemblance to the Pauline phrase, ‘videmus nunc per speculum in aenigmate.’3 Often found at the heart of contemplative Judeo-Christian expression, St Paul’s enigmatic phrase to the Corinthians encapsulates both the elusive nature of mystical experience and the 1 George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1980), p. 193. 2 Gerard Steen writes of Lakoff and Johnson’s cognitive metaphor theory that it redefines metaphor as ‘a highly revealing instance of the human capacity for making sense’ and a crucial component in the construction of ‘conceptual world[s] with [their] own laws.’ See Understanding Metaphor in Literature: An Empirical Approach (London: Longman, 1994), p. 3. Also René Dirven and Wolf Paprotté, ‘Introduction,’ in The Ubiquity of Metaphor: Metaphor in Language and Thought, ed. by René Dirven and Wolf Paprotté (Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 1985), pp. vii-xix. Here at p. viii. 3 1 Corinthians 13:12. ‘We see now through a glass in a dark manner.’ All Biblical quotations are taken from the Vulgate and/ or the Douay-Rheims translation. 7 resultant struggle to articulate its perfection using the imperfect tool of human language.4 The shared conceptual underpinnings of contemporary metaphor theory and of Christian mystical expression form the platform of this study of the works of two very different fourteenth-century French mystics, Marguerite d’Oingt and Marguerite Porete. Little is known about the lives of these two writers, although their legacies mark tipping points in the long histories of religious and French literature. Writing in a combination of Latin, Old French, and her local Francoprovençal, Marguerite d’Oingt (c.1240-1310) is responsible for two short visionary works and a biography of Béatrix d’Ornacieu (c.1260- 1308/9), as well as a small collection of letters, apparently all composed within the confines of her Carthusian monastery at Poleteins, in the
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