Transformed Within, Transformed Without: The Enactment of Religious Conversion in Medieval and Early Modern European Saint Plays Emily Ciavarella Kuntz Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy under the Executive Committee of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2020 © 2020 Emily Ciavarella Kuntz All Rights Reserved Abstract Transformed Within, Transformed Without: The Enactment of Religious Conversion in Medieval and Early Modern European Saint Plays Emily Ciavarella Kuntz My dissertation investigates the ways in which both medieval and early modern saint plays depict and incite religious conversion through self-aware theatrical techniques. In each of my chapters, I examine one or two popular saint plays from a given period and area (medieval England, medieval France, early modern Spain, and early modern England) and show how each play invites the audience to undergo a spiritual shift parallel to that of the saint protagonist. These playmakers harnessed the affective power and technology of theatrical performance to invite the audience to engage with performed religious conversion in a controlled, celebratory environment and to encourage them to convert toward a more deeply felt Christianity. The plays reconfigured the audience’s sensory and intellectual understanding of Christian theology in order for the audience to recognize spiritual truth within an inherently communal, participatory, and performative space. The plays I examine depend on the audience’s familiarity with theatrical culture and practice in order to distinguish between sincere and insincere religious performance. By making the process of conversion a theatrical performance onstage, these plays could advocate for the theatrical medium as a genuine and effective catalyst for spiritual renewal. In addition to joining the conversation on the nature and goals of early European theatre, my dissertation also argues for the continued intersection between performance studies and conversion studies, demonstrating the ways in which theatrical performance elucidates the ways in which communities can instigate and collectively feel conversion. Table of Contents Acknowledgments.......................................................................................................................... iii Introduction: Converting by Play.................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: Performing the Internal, Internalizing the Performance: The Digby Mary Magdalene, The Digby Conversion of Saint Paul, and Theatrical Conversion in The Medieval English Saint Play ............................................................................................................................................... 19 1.1 The Medieval English Saint Play ........................................................................................ 19 1.2 Saint Paul and the Journey to Joy ...................................................................................... 23 1.3 Mary Magdalene and Conversion, Inward and Outward .................................................... 35 1.4 Mary Magdalene, Conversion and Theatrical Pretense ...................................................... 43 1.5 Conclusion: Living Models................................................................................................. 53 Chapter 2: Converting Relics Onstage in Le Mistere de Saint Quentin ....................................... 55 2.1 Bodies and Saints ............................................................................................................... 55 2.2 Conversion in Saint Quentin ............................................................................................... 59 2.3 Relics, Reliquaries, and Material Rejuvenation .................................................................. 66 2.4 Relics Unrealized ................................................................................................................ 70 2.5 Saint Quentin, Prop Relics, and Theatricality as Reliquary ................................................ 74 2.6 Conclusion: The Converting Community ........................................................................... 82 Chapter 3: Sacred Through Secular, Saint Through Actor: The Genre Conversions of Lope de Vega’s Lo fingido verdadero and El niño inocente de la Guardia ............................................... 88 3.1 Saints in the Early Modern Playhouse ................................................................................ 88 3.2 Lope de Vega, the comedia, and the comedia de santos .................................................... 90 i 3.3 The anxieties of metatheatrical conversion......................................................................... 93 3.4 Ginés’ Conversion in Lo fingido verdadero ....................................................................... 95 3.5 Genre Conversion in Lo fingido verdadero ........................................................................ 98 3.6 Child’s Playing in El niño inocente .................................................................................. 112 3.7 When God Takes the Stage ............................................................................................... 119 3.8 Conclusion: The Saint’s Play and the Theatre of Conversion .......................................... 126 Chapter 4: Communion of Plays: A Shoemaker A Gentleman, The Virgin Martyr, and Saintly Conversion on the Early Modern English Stage ......................................................................... 130 4.1 The Red Bull's Saint Plays ................................................................................................ 130 4.2 Saints and Early Modern England .................................................................................... 134 4.3 A Shoemaker a Gentleman and Christianization Through Friendship.............................. 137 4.4 The Virgin Martyr and Super/Natural Conversion ........................................................... 151 4.5 Conclusion: Seeing Together ............................................................................................ 166 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 168 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................... 174 ii Acknowledgments I would first like to thank my dissertation committee: Julie Stone Peters, William B. Worthen, and Eleanor Johnson. I am deeply grateful for their support, guidance, and good humor over my six years of graduate school. I would also like to thank my additional readers, Patricia Grieve and Erika Lin, for their time and astute comments. My time at Columbia was shaped first and foremost by my graduate student peers in the Theatre and Performance department who proved to be not only a great group of thinkers but also a great group of people. I especially want to thank Danielle Drees, Warren Kluber, Emily Madison, Taarini Mookherjee, Annie Potter, Rosa Schneider, Anna Waller, and Buck Wanner for their insights and friendship. I would also like to give a special shout-out to my friends in English and Comparative Literature, Kimberly Takahata and Li Qi Peh, who along with Danielle Drees constituted the dissertation writing group that kept me accountable and above all sane. Early on in my dissertation writing process, I was hired by the Columbia Writing Center to help Columbia’s student writers. This job introduced me to an invaluable community of passionate writers and pedagogues that proved crucial to developing my own ideas. Kip Adams and I talked through my dissertation each week over multiple semesters, and it truly made all the difference. Finally, I want to thank my parents, my sister, and above all my husband Andrew for their unwavering belief in me from day one. iii Introduction: Converting by Play In the Middle English A Tretise of Miraclis Pleyinge (1380-1425), the authors denounce the seemingly common practice of “miraclis pleyinge,” where miracles or other religious scenes are represented “in gamen and pley.” The exact practices are not clear and could refer to a variety of theatrical practices with religious subject matters.1 In any case, these practices were prevalent enough to inspire the authors, who appear to be proto-Protestant Lollards, to speak out against them as idolatrous vanities. In order to make their case, the authors construct a semi- dialogue in which they outline the cases for “miraclis pleyinge” in order to refute them. Ironically, in writing this treatise, the authors provided theatre historians with an invaluable resource into the intentions of a Middle English playmaker and playgoer. Chief among those arguments is the belief that not only theatrical performances could be effective catalysts for conversion, but also that they were potentially more effective than “ernest” action: Ther ben men that only by ernestful doinge wilen be convertid to God, so ther been othere men that wilen not be convertid to God but by gamen and pley. And now on dayes men ben not convertid by the ernestful doing of God ne of men, thannne now it is time and skilful to assayen to conveertyn the puple by pley and gamen as by miraclis pleyinge and other maner mirthes. [Just as are men that are only converted to God by earnest action,