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Back Margery Kempe Save as PDF
Chapters (69)
  1. Cover
  2. Biographical Notes
  3. Title Page
  4. INTRODUCTION
  5. MARGERY KEMPE
  6. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  7. Dedication
  8. Front
  9. PART ONE
  10. 1
  11. 2
  12. 3
  13. 4
  14. 5
  15. 6
  16. 7
  17. 8
  18. 9
  19. 10
  20. 11
  21. 12
  22. 13
  23. 14
  24. 15
  25. 16
  26. PART TWO
  27. 17
  28. 18
  29. 19
  30. 20
  31. 21
  32. 22
  33. 23
  34. 24
  35. 25
  36. 26
  37. 27
  38. 28
  39. 29
  40. 30
  41. 31
  42. PART THREE
  43. 32
  44. 33
  45. 34
  46. 35
  47. 36
  48. 37
  49. 38
  50. 39
  51. 40
  52. 41
  53. 42
  54. 43
  55. 44
  56. 45
  57. 46
  58. PART FOUR
  59. 47
  60. 48
  61. 49
  62. 50
  63. 51
  64. 52
  65. 53
  66. 54
  67. 55
  68. 56
  69. MY MARGERY, MARGERY’S BOB

There are moments in the book that are designed to give us a spectacular shock. These mostly center on the figure of Jesus. Glück is unafraid of offering him a full humanity and a frailer divinity. It is noted early in the book that “He had been crying all weekend.” Later, he states, “I spasmed eleven times.” Later again, “Jesus and Mary squatted, making little cries, then looked curiously at each other’s shit.” This is no more blasphemous than Renaissance paintings showing Jesus’s bare legs and thighs, his naked torso, his face in ecstasy and agony. He has always been there for us, flesh and blood.

Such waverings in the book from the sacred to the profane mirror Glück’s own movements as an author. He seeks both to control the tone and follow the aleatory flow of his own inspiration. He wishes to tell both Margery’s story in all its fervid strangeness and his own in all its calm melancholy. He wishes to invoke the shock and pain of the Crucifixion in a time when gay men were dying of AIDS. But he also wishes to intercede on behalf of the narrator as intruder, interloper, the man who wrote the book and will have to live outside its pages into the future: “I am drawn to modernism but my faith is impure. I am no more the solitary author of this book than I alone invent the fiction of my life. As I write, I read my experience as well as Margery’s. Is that appropriation?—that I am also the reader, oscillating in a nowhere between what I invent and what changes me?”

Margery comes back to England. Dates are given, as elsewhere in the book, to establish verisimilitude. For Glück, this is a loaded idea, one he seeks both to explore and explode. It matters that the reader believes that the difficult truth and moments of pain he experiences with L., his lover, are true, or as true as he can make them, and as revealing as Margery was in her writing when she sought to reveal the quality of her devotion and vision.

Our narrator has visions too: “I raise my eyes to a dark window seven stories high where L. lives in New York. The window is lit, he is flesh and blood, he leans into another man in amusement and then warmth. I whisper his name to elevate this story with the strength of my sexuality.”