Finding Anne Askew's Voice

Though the analysis of Elaine Beilin's chapter, she attempts to answer how society's understanding of gender influenced Anne's role as a martyr and how the understanding of gender blocked or hid Anne's voice. By analyzing the traditional roles of gender, we can hope to further understand how Anne Askew showed defiance in her writings and why she became a Protestant martyr in a male-dominated society.

During the 16th-century, women were seen as weak, frail, and of lower intelligence than men. Though there was an understanding that women were inferior to men in every essence, Anne's writings challenged and defied the gender norms, as well as the hierarchy of the Church and State. Beilin uses John Bale's and John Foxes' publication of Anne's examinations to understand gender and to rationalize why Anne Askew would portray herself as a defiant woman, since this was going against the societal norms of gender at the time. Bale was perplexed by Anne's examinations. He believed in the traditional notions of gender and admired Anne Askew for what she had done, but the strict gender norms in society obscured the reality that Anne was an intelligent and bold woman who fought for what she believed in. The only way that Bale could understand how Anne could be so defiant was that the defiance came not from a woman, but from God directly. Bale admired the "unwomanly power in her words and deeds by attributing them to divine grace," which disregarded how Anne wanted to portray herself in her writings (Beilin 31). Bale tried to interpret Anne's writing, but all he did was conform her to the gender norms that she was fighting to break away from, unlike John Foxes' publication of Anne's examinations, which allows Anne's writings to be read in their true form. Bale used Anne's examinations to be a prophet, rather than being a medium for readers, like Foxe. Beilin states that, "while Anne shared Bale's belief in God's strength and her own human weakness, by the very act of writing down her examinations, Askew created a woman of faith, strength, and purpose," which shows that it was not her gender, but that fact that she had human weakness that caused God to work in her and that she had enough intelligence to enact action of God's work, unlike the belief of Bale. She found her voice through her writing's, which is evident in John Foxe's Book of Martyrs.

By also looking at Anne's background, one can understand her boldness and outward defiance of male authority, beginning with her husband and ending with the hierarchy of the Church. She had to conform and obey her father, which resulted in a difficult and loveless marriage. As a way to escape the confinements she had been forced in by all the men in her life, she began to write and be bold especially in matters religion, since she believed that God was working through her to establish the true faith. Her writing shows that Anne was a "God-fearing and honest woman" who told her truth and did not care who she offended (Beilin 36). We see her voice and power in reading her examination in which she, as Beilin states, "consistently presents herself in control of her questioners by throwing their questions back, responding with another question, smiling, or reprimanding them for their poor judgement," meaning that this was a way that Askew was determined, not only to prove that she was doing God's work, but that she was also an intellectual that challenged the gender norms of the time, proving that women are not inferior to men (Beilin 35). She proved to her interrogators and torturers that God was acting through her by using quotes of the Scripture to prove that their beliefs and that of the Church were not true. Through her strength and faith, she was able to withstand torturing on the rack from her interrogators since she knew that God's work needed to be done no matter the dire consequences. John Bale's version of Anne's examination distorted what Anne wanted people to understand, but she was redeemed in John Foxe's publication, which did not try to interpret Anne's words but allowed readers to see Anne's voice, without the patriarchy trying to interpret her words for their own gain.