The Lives of Mary Ward (1585-1645)

Abstract

This thesis is the first extended monographic study of the life-writing of the seventeenth-century Catholic exile, mystic and reformer Mary Ward (1585-1645). Starting with the premise that previous scholarship on Ward has privileged the attempt to construct a verifiable narrative corresponding to the life of the single historical figure, it seeks to re-centre the texts themselves and re-situate them in their seventeenth-century intellectual, spiritual and cultural contexts. Adopting a methodology inspired by the feminist formalist compromise between the biographical recovery work of previous generations of scholars and 'close reading' strategies privileging the text, it uses previous historio-biographical scholarship to inform its identification of pertinent contexts and interpretive strategies as suggested by the texts themselves. The thesis begins by analysing the two introductions appended to Ward's longest English-language autobiographical autograph manuscript. Using recent scholarship on Renaissance paratexts, the first chapter suggests that the introductions not only present the reader with a strategy for reading Ward's autobiographical writing, but also for approaching the world beyond the text. Bringing the introductions into conversation with examples by contemporary Protestant Englishwomen, it proposes that these texts demonstrate an alternative paradigm for understanding early modern women's relationship to their lives, both in terms of written record and lived experience. It suggests that these introductions demonstrate that these early modern women conceived of themselves primarily as readers of an over-arching ur-text authored by God and that they present their readers with strategies for understanding and approaching their own lives in these terms. Chapter 2 presents two sets of notes produced by Ward in preparation for the practice of General Confession according to the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola in order to identify the textual features of the writing Ward produced in support of these practices. It then shows how the presence of these features in the introductions explored in Chapter 1 and the life-narrative they accompany demonstrate the influence of the cognitive processes inculcated by Ward's regular practice of the Spiritual Exercises. Chapter 3 presents the earliest biographical account of Ward's life as a demonstration of her own and her followers' conviction that their unenclosed, apostolic Institute constituted a legitimate form of religious life despite its failure to achieve official Church approval. Analysis alongside other examples of life-writing produced within the English convents in exile suggests that Ward's biographical text mobilised the conventions of various convent texts to demonstrate its full and genuine participation in this culture. Chapter 4 constitutes the first literary study of a contemporary Italian-language life-narrative in its own right. It suggests that this text employs a variety of strategies in order to replace Ward's stubborn reputation for heresy with one for orthodoxy whilst simultaneously navigating recent restrictions enforced by the Catholic Church on the representation of holy individuals. Ultimately, this chapter suggests that this Italian text fails in its attempts to avoid implying Ward's sanctity by placing such an insistent emphasis on her orthodoxy that it results in her representation as unorthodox. The final chapter makes the case for the consideration of the 'Painted Life' of Mary Ward as an example of early modern life-writing. By highlighting three of the key characteristics of early modern life-writing - sociality, exemplarity and ethos - in the paintings, this chapter suggests that rather than demonstrating continuity with medieval traditions, features such as allusions to saints' Lives are used as authorising strategies in a way that is characteristically early modern. As a whole, the thesis demonstrates the important contribution that literary approaches can make to the study of Mary Ward. In addition, it uses the life-writing of Mary Ward as a case study for the validity of a methodology for the study of life-writing that de-centres in the individual in favour of the text.

Date of Award	13 Nov 2023
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	The University of Manchester
Supervisor	Naomi Baker (Main Supervisor) & Fred Schurink (Co Supervisor)