Consider This from NPR - Bonus Episode: "Margery," the medieval memoirist

Episode Date: February 9, 2025

For centuries, scholars only had one version of the life of Margery Kempe, an English mystic who lived in the 14th and 15th centuries — until a ping pong match revealed her story in her own words. For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.orgEmail us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hey there, Consider This listeners. We're not normally in your ears on Saturdays, but today we've got a special bonus episode for you. It's the first in our new series of short-form audio documentaries. It's got medieval monks, rapturous crying fits, ping pong, and a little bit of time travel. So stick around for Saturday, February 8th, it's Consider This from NPR. I'm Scott Detra.

It's Consider This from NPR. What if you could pick up the phone and call the past? Today's story does just that. It's brought to us by the Berlin-based producer, Sara Zare Hushiori Ha. This is Marjorie. Recently I've been thinking about what it would be like to call Marjorie Kemp. How would I talk to someone who lived over 500 years ago? Hey Marge. Hello Mrs. Kemp. Hi, this is Sara. Marjorie!

Hi Marjorie. Eh. Marjorie! We haven't met. Also you're dead. Erm... I would like to tell her about this monk. His name was Winkende Ward.

And after her death, he took the liberty to republish a few pages of her book. And he called it a short treatise of contemplation. We don't know what else she wrote about in her book, but he references it and so we know that it existed at some point. And in his treatise of contemplation, he describes her, Marjorie Kemp. And he describes her as a very quiet person. A good Christian woman who worships Jesus on her own terms. A good wife.

A good mother. A calm listener. And that's about all that we knew about Marjorie Kemp. She was a devout, quiet Christian who had 14 kids and lived in a small village in England called Kingslyn. And then I would like to tell her about this ping pong match that happened in the 1930s, also in England. But I guess first I would have to explain what ping pong is. So it's a game that's usually played by two to four people and each person holds a paddle in their

hand and you try to play so the other person can't take the ball and you miss the ball. And I guess that's all that you would need to know for now. Anyway, the crazy part about this ping pong match was that one of the players stepped onto the ball and then went back into his country house to get a new one. And as he was looking through the cupboard to find a ball, he found something else, a book. It looked old, like really, really old, and it was full of notes. He took it to the library to have it checked out by someone professional. And it turns

out that this was Marjorie's book, the book that the monk had read and chosen a few parts from to republish. So now there are these two documents. One written by a monk about a quiet, inward-turned Marjorie Kemp, whom he uses as an example of how to be a good, calm Christian woman. And then, newly discovered, there's another one. The original book, Marjorie Kemp's own version, the entire thing, written by herself. Well, actually, she couldn't read or write, so she had to hire scribes, but either way, a book by her own account. In the Middle Ages,

there were a few women who had books written about their lives. But normally, the procedure was that someone was a holy woman because they had performed a miracle or two and then gathered a following because of that. And then when they died, someone else would write a book about their life. But Marjorie, she hasn't performed a miracle, not that I know of anyway, and she also didn't gather a following, not in her lifetime. So I guess at some point she must have just decided to write a book about herself so that she would be remembered in the way that she wanted. A few medievalists started reading her book expecting kind of a long-form version of the monk's treaties, but soon they found out that her version of herself was wildly different to what the monk published. She was very Christian, but she wasn't calm, and she definitely wasn't quiet.

And she was a mother of 14 kids, but she doesn't really talk about them. Instead, she talks about anything and everything else, and in so much detail. She writes about food and what she likes and doesn't like and how she tries to become a vegetarian at some point, but people are being very difficult about it. She writes about what is arguably the first English account of postpartum depression,

hers was cured by Jesus, about her travels. She traveled to Christian sites of worship all over Europe, sometimes with company, but often alone. She writes about how she decides to wear all white in her forties. Wearing white was a sign of virginity, and Marjorie had already had 14 kids at that time, so definitely not a virgin. And people in her village did not take this lightly.

She writes about her sexual desires not just towards her husband, but also towards other people, and towards Jesus. And she writes about what kind of became her signature move, crying. not just towards her husband, but also towards other people and towards Jesus. And she writes about what kind of became her signature move, crying. She cries at every occasion, which gets her excluded from all kinds of social gatherings and in some cases even banned from church services. She cries every time she thinks about Jesus or Mary or both. When she traveled to Jerusalem, she was so overwhelmed by everything

and cried so hard that she fell off her donkey. Overall, she's just this... badass who does all of these things that the monk definitely left out on purpose because they don't fit the image that he wanted to create. He totally monkwashed her and took away all of the sexiness and the directness and the dirtiness and the realness of her story. The person you are trying to reach has been unavailable for over 500 years. Please leave a message after the tone. Hey Marjorie, this is Sarah calling from the future. I just wanted to leave a

quick note and tell you that your book has survived more than 500 years and has made it to the 21st century. It's actually now considered to be the first autobiography in English that is written by a woman so that's really cool. Congrats! Your book means a lot to me. I think it's really cool and super brave that you decided to write everything down in so much detail. Thank you. Okay, that's it. Thanks and bye. To me, the Book of Marjorie Kemp is like a little reminder that for a lot of history that we know, we only have the monk version. The edit. Not just because someone chose the parts that they wanted to remember, but because people couldn't write their stories down,

or they thought they were too normal, or even too dangerous to be remembered, or because the stories were simply lost. History isn't this thing that we get to document if we only look close enough. It's always just a selection. The book of Marjorie Kemp honestly fills me with joy. Not because I like her so much or because I find it particularly easy to relate to her or her lifestyle, but because it makes it easier for me to imagine the existence of the other stories, the ones that no one wrote down, the ones in our new series of short form audio documentaries.

It was written and produced by Sara and was edited by Yasmine Baoumi. This episode was produced by Noah Caldwell, our editor is Courtney Dornig, and our executive producer is Sammy Yannigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Scott Detro. Thanks for watching guys!