Honoring Mary: Scholarship, Art, & Faith

Who’s Play is it Anyway?

2015-03-04T13:30:46Z

Early on in the process, I was talking with Elizabeth Colandene (Mary) about how Mary doesn’t really speak much in The Annunciation, and it’s interesting that in a play that ostensibly focuses on the Divine Conception we hear more from Joseph than we do the Virgin Mary (whereas we only get a few short lines of dialogue from Mary, we get a whole page-long monologue from Joseph). Because she speaks so little, it’s a bit more difficult to gain insight into what Mary, the dramatic character, might be thinking or feeling in that moment speaking to Gabriel or convincing her husband that the child she bears is God’s. All of that is subtextual. Joseph, on the other hand, is a veritable open book—we know exactly how he’s processing his doubt about his wife’s fidelity because he comes out and says it…and then repeats it for good measure. So, why do we think that The Annunciation is Mary’s play, and not Joseph’s? Is this a play about Mary?

Well, to be honest, this play honors both Mary and Joseph—in some ways it’s Mary’s play and in other ways it’s Joseph’s. This ambiguity stems from the fact that The Annunciation is just one small part of a whole epic narrative. It simultaneously launches Mary’s story, and encapsulates Joseph’s whole arc. So, while yes we do get to see more of Joseph’s inner machinations and bear witness to his internal conflict and resolution, Mary’s role has just begun to unfold.

In the Wakefield text, from which we drew the basis for our script, Mary actually has a much more active role than in other Corpus Christi cycles of that time. There are actually textual indications that the Wakefield playwright added Mary into several of the plays in the cycle—in these instances, the dialogue is written with a distinct rhythmic pattern that many scholars attribute to a single author. In this play text, each time Mary reappears she’s a little older, a little wiser, and taking on more of the dramatic action. Her speeches gradually get longer, she appears onstage more, and eventually becomes a force driving the action forward. The Wakefield even concludes with Mary bidding Jesus’ disciples to go forth and preach the word of God (whereas in the Bible, the Holy Spirit appears and delivers this message). How awesome that the final image of this play cycle is an older woman presiding over a group of men, and delivering the word of God? What a radical notion that a woman could be the impetus for Man’s salvation? Then again, Mary is chosen for that specific reason—to bear the son of God, and to spark the story of Man’s redemption.

So, I suppose Joseph can have The Annunciation. After all, Mary has the last word.

Finding the Truth in Translation

2015-02-20T19:37:49Z

In the previous entry, we talked a little bit about the original text, and how it was treated in medieval England. Well, this was well and good for medieval Europeans, but why adapt these plays (either in whole or in part) for a modern audience? After all, what may have made sense in the cultural milieu of northern England in the 1300’s, might not resonate in the same way with contemporary ideas of religion and spirituality; ideas about the self and one’s place in society; or even ideas of womanhood and motherhood. How do we bridge that gap?

All of these questions were rolling in my mind as I read through these old English texts. The language itself was a barrier:

“I am the first, the last also,
Oone god in mageste;
Meruelus, of myght most,
ffader, & son, & holy goost”
Here’s what The Lord’s Prayer would have sounded like back in the day:

The cadences of the text are more akin to modern day Dutch than what we know as English today, and often more difficult to read than Shakespeare. Still, with modern resources like the Oxford English Dictionary and the wealth of scholarship available on Old English pronunciation, meaning, and etymology, I was able to work through this barrier (it was actually pretty fun, once I wrapped my head around spelling conventions).

Looking specifically at The Annunciation, once I had adapted the text into modern spelling and language, the themes that came to light weren’t quite so antiquated. Sure, we generally don’t make all of the men in town come to the temple to compete for the hand of the next marriageable girl (but when put like that, it does sound pretty much like The Bachelorette). Still, I was astonished by how, well, human I found the depictions of Mary and Joseph. They both grapple with doubt, encounters with elements beyond their understanding, and ultimately the nature of their faith.

These are all things about which a modern audience (and certainly this humble dramaturg) struggle with: what does it mean to be faithful? What does it mean to be human? Where do we encounter the divine in everyday life? We’ll probably never be able to answer these questions in a definitive sense, but it’s in their engagement, tackling, grappling, and play that we can begin to understand the non-understandable.

Let’s Go to the Source

2015-02-20T19:22:11Z

The Wakefield Corpus Christi Cycle is a collection of plays that encompass the biblical stories of the creation, fall, and redemption of man. The surviving medieval text from Wakefield dates from about the late 1400’s, or earlier, and was performed in the town of Wakefield in Yorkshire. There are similar texts from the towns of York and Chester, as well as a text called the N-Town cycle that historians theorize traveled among smaller English towns; “N” stands for “nomen,” a medieval version of [insert town name here].

By the end of the sixteenth century, these plays were extraordinarily popular. They helped disseminate church teachings to a largely illiterate population; because they were composed from biblical and non-biblical texts they often helped fill gaps in the Bible’s narrative; and they also served to celebrate the real presence of the body of Christ in the Eucharist at a time when the principle of transubstantiation was a relatively new addition to church doctrine. At times reverent and solemn, at others bawdy and celebratory, performances could last anywhere from 24-72 hours, featuring elaborate sets, paid actors (evidenced in the York house books), and financial, material, and human resources from every guild in town.

The Annunciation embodies the solemn/religious and festival/celebratory spirit of the medieval Corpus Christi pageant; Mary appears, reverent and pure, alongside Joseph, portrayed as an old man who speaks largely in innuendos, complaining about “kids these days.” This combination of the divine and the human speaks to an inherent complexity in these ancient play texts that mirrors an equally complex perception of religion, divinity, and humanity in medieval Europe.