Ghostly GladnessThe Soul Music of Richard Rolle, Fourteenth Century Mystic
introductionRichard Rolle, hermit of Hampole, produced a remarkable series of spiritual works in both Latin and English which were perhaps the first great literature to appear in England after the Conquest. In the period following his death in 1349 Rolle was the most popular of all English writers, and this popularity endured until the Reformation. England’s rejection of Catholicism plunged Rolle’s works into obscurity; when Carl Horstmann edited the first modern printed edition in 1895, Yorkshire Writers: Richard Rolle and his Followers, he intended more to provide a link in the history of English literature than to reawaken an interest in Christian mysticism. It is the purpose of this study to examine Rolle’s work in its spiritual context, and to focus especially on the development of his two major themes: the love of God, and the experience of canor, or song, which this love produced in Rolle’s heart. His burning desire to communicate this experience was often at odds with the ineffable nature of mystic rapture, and it is exactly this antithesis, this tension, which creates the great verve and power of Rolle’s writing.
© Michael Fleming Oxford, England January, 1984
a brief note on the textThis essay was written initially as an academic exercise, and of course every quotation was duly footnoted. I have omitted the “scholarly apparatus” from this web version for several reasons. First, it is a cumbersome intrusion to the casual reader — and who knows, there may even be casual readers in the field of fourteenth-century mysticism. Second, hypertext documentation would be a nightmarish bore for me to encode. Finally, I’m putting this on the web solely for interested scholars and aficionados of medieval mysticism, and most definitely not as a “research service” for students writing about Rolle (as a college teacher I know all about that stuff). By omitting the scholarly apparatus I’m making the essay unfit to be copied (i.e., plagiarized). Anyone wishing to know the source of any quotation contained in this essay can contact me via e-mail. The quotations from Rolle’s Middle English are drawn from H. E. Allen’s 1963 Oxford edition, The English Writings of Richard Rolle. A little explanation is in order here. Rolle lived and wrote many centuries before there was anything like a concept of “correct” spelling in English; e.g., his word for loving might be rendered “lufing” and then, a few lines later, “lufyng.” Further, no manuscript in Rolle’s own hand survived the Middle Ages, and Miss Allen’s editorial task was made tremendously complex by the welter of copies found in English libraries — copies often produced, we can assume, by untrained and sometimes all but illiterate scribes. The English language was going through a period of wrenching change during the period of Rolle’s popularity (roughly 1350-1500): ”The Great Vowel Shift,” the introduction into England of the printing press, and the ascendancy of “southern” (i.e., London) dialects, all stand between our Modern English and the rough medieval Yorkshire dialect of Richard Rolle. Still, anyone who has learned to struggle through Chaucer, at least to the point where it isn’t such a struggle after all, should have little trouble grappling with Rolle’s English. Think phonetically and consider cognate spellings; a phrase like “sekenes and hele,” for example, isn’t really all that different from the Modern English “sickness and health.” Finally, Middle English letters no longer in use (and certainly unavailable in ASCI font sets!), like the thorn and yogh has been transliterated into their modern equivalents. (There is no point whatever in considering Rolle’s language apart from the sound of that language. For a more thorough discussion of Middle English phonology, please see “How to read Rolle’s lyric poetry.”) I would like to gratefully acknowledge the help of Cathy de Heer for sharing her Dutchgirl website, and especially Dorland Mountain Arts Colony of Temecula, California, for providing me with the opportunity to dig up these old bones, rave upon the moors, and listen to my own music.
© Michael Fleming Temecula, California December, 1998
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