The Burdens of Sister Margaret; Inside a Seventeenth-Century Convent; Abridged Edition

by Craig Harline

• ISBN13: 9780300081213
• ISBN10: 0300081219
• Edition: Abridged
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2000-08-11
• Publisher: Yale University Press

Summary

Based on a treasure trove of letters, this fascinating book tells the history of a seventeenth-century nun in a convent in Leuven and how her complaints -- of sexual harassment, fears of demonic possession, alliances among the other sisters against her -- led to her banishment from the convent on two occasions. Highly acclaimed when it was first published as a revealing look at female religious life in early modern Europe, the book is now available in an abridged paperbound version with a new preface by the author.

Table of Contents

To the Curious Reader	vii
A Note on Usage	xiii
Dramatis Personae	xv
Prologue: Remembering	1	(6)
BOOK ONE How Just About Everyone Came to Loathe Sister Margaret
Beginning	7	(13)
Demons	20	(8)
Confessors	28	(14)
Despair	42	(11)
The Specialist	53	(13)
Pilgrim	66	(12)
Fulminations	78	(9)
No Balm in Bethlehem	87	(16)
BOOK TWO How Margaret Sought Her Revenge and Became the Watchdog of Reform All at Once
The Burden of Bethlehem	103	(8)
Favorites	111	(16)
Almsgetting	127	(17)
Worldly Ways	144	(29)
The Visitors	173	(18)
BOOK THREE How Margaret's Hard-Won Triumphs Partly Fizzled Out
Justification	191	(14)
Capitulation	205	(8)
Finis	213	(4)
Epilogue	217	(8)
Bibliographical Notes	225	(34)
Acknowledgments	259	(2)
Index	261