Utopia in the Archives of Early Modern Syon Abbey

About the Speaker

Alexandra Verini is Assistant Professor of English at Ashoka University. She earned her Ph.D in English at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 2018. She holds an M.A. in English from Columbia University and a B.A. in History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art. Her research focuses on medieval and early modern women's literary culture, with particular interests in theories of friendship and religious life. She has published her work in academic journals such as Medieval Feminist Forum, English Studies and Feminist Studies. Her current book project, New Kingdoms of Womanhood: Medieval and Early Modern Englishwomen’s Utopias, makes the case for the vitality of women’s utopian thought in the pre-modern era. She also leads the digital project Early Women Writers, which catalogs and maps women authors around the world between 500 and 1600CE.

Abstract

With the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Syon Abbey, a foundation of the Bridgettine order and the richest nunnery in England, was exiled to Europe. Traveling first to Flanders and then to France, this spiritual community eventually resettled in Lisbon in 1594 and remained there for almost three centuries. Drawing on a range of visual and textual archival material from Syon Abbey’s early modern period, this paper shows how a Catholic monastic community during a period of exile and uncertainty developed a utopian rhetoric that hinged on female community. Repurposing negative stereotypes usually associated with religious women, including weakness and subservience, the images and texts that this community produced portray the abbey’s nuns as figures for a lost English Catholicism. In doing so, Syon made a case for the importance of female community as a means of preserving the pre-Reformation English past and reenacting it in the future.

Report

In her lecture, Professor Alexandra Verini focuses on the Syon Abbey, a foundation of the Bridgettine order and the ideas of Utopianism that developed in the Catholic convent communities in Early Modern and Medieval Europe. Dr. Verini uses the ideas of Utopia as proposed by Thomas Moore in his influential work and that of ‘Utopia’ being used as a tool to achieve the perfect life. She uses multiple archival works from the 15th-16th centuries to create an understanding of the lives of Sisters in Catholic communities. She develops the ideas of how the Catholic monastic communities such as Syon Abbey reflected the ideas of a ‘Utopian’ rhetoric in context of the patriarchal nature of Medieval Europe.

Through the analysis of multiple literary texts including the biography of Mary Chamapne and The Myroure of oure Ladye, a guidebook for nuns containing a special set of prayers; Dr Verini tries to carve out an image of nuns which is much diverse than the pre-existing narratives. We can see that women ruled at least a part of their own actions in the convents. Male priests were officially in charge; however, convents were still radical places where women elected their leaders and decided how to carry on their daily activities. Reading between the lines through the sources, helps us to understand the special relationship between the nuns and Virgin Mary which was a source of agency superior to that of monks. Dr Verini uses visual sources and archival sources to give a glimpse of the authority of females in the Bridgettine order. The Liturgical Manuscripts imply a form of the rigidity of rules that the nuns had to follow, however, shows that the Nuns could choose minor details of their routines and had some co-authorship of their lives. This is a form of cultivation of a Utopian ideal that was ‘not yet’ available and to create an idea for the future.

Dr Verini also discusses the nature of the Syon Abbey and how it considered itself to be the custodian of English Catholicism. Mary Champne’s biography depicts her journey from England to Flanders to become a Nun at Syon Abbey. Through this source and others, dr. Verini tries to assert how the Syon Nuns see themselves as the New Israelites in the narrative and their strife to bring back the Order to England. This has served as the ultimate goal for the Syon Abbey as it moved all around Europe over the centuries. Along with this, Elizabeth Sander’s letters emphasize the return of English Catholicism and depicts the uncertainty of this happening. This is a depiction of the kind of ‘Utopian’ return to English that has not yet been achieved but will be in the future. It is understood from the analysis that the nuns started to represent themselves as a Utopia, not just as a representation of better futures for women but also representing the possibility of the Catholic return to the English homeland.

Dr Verini concludes her lecture by analyzing the Arundel Manuscript from 1623 which gives the description of the Syon Abbey’s attempts to persuade Princess Maria of Catholic Spain to marry the English Kind Charles 1 to restore English Catholicism. They try this persuasion by emphasizing the confident portrayal of women with their strong connection to the Virgin Mary. However, the Syon sisters are ultimately unsuccessful in their endeavors to return to England and achieve their ultimate Utopian vision. However, it is important to note that Utopia is defined by failure and a vision of future success. In conclusion, Dr. Verini tries to understand the diverse roles of women in Early Modern and Medieval Europe through literary and visual sources.