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Julian of Norwich and her children today: Editions, translations and versions of her revelations

Abstract
The viability of such concepts as "authorial intention," "the original text," "critical edition" and, above all, "scholarly editorial objectivity" is not what it was, and a study of the textual progeny of the revelations of Julian of Norwich--editions, versions, translations and selections--does little to rehabilitate them. Rather it tends to support the view that a history of reading is indeed a history of misreading or, more positively, that texts can have an organic life of their own that allows them to reproduce and evolve quite independently of their author. Julian's texts have had a more robustly continuous life than those of any other Middle English mystic. Their history--in manuscript and print, in editions more or less approximating Middle English and in translations more or less approaching Modern English--is virtually unbroken since the fifteenth century. But on this perilous journey, many and strange are the clutches into which she and her textual progeny have fallen.
Type
Chapter in Book
Type of thesis
Series
Citation
Barratt, A. (2009). Julian of Norwich and her children today: Editions, translations, and versions of her revelations. In S. Salih & D. N. Baker (Eds.), Julian of Norwich’s Legacy: Medieval Mysticism and Post-Medieval Reception. New York, United States: Palgrave Macmillan.
Date
2009
Publisher
Palgrave Macmillan
Degree
Supervisors
Rights
This is an author’s version of a book chapter published in "Julian of Norwich’s Legacy: Medieval Mysticism and Post-Medieval Reception". © 2009 Sarah Salih and Denise N. Baker. Used with permission.