The Works of Richard Methley, translated by Barbara Newman and with an introduction by me, finally arrived in my mailbox today! It is not too slim a volume, nice paperback production, and very affordable - $29.95. Order one here:
This volume makes Methley's unusual Latin mystical works available to a wide audience for the first time. It's a great gift for anyone interested in medieval mysticism, the Carthusians, monastic contemplation, or late medieval Latin literature.
Consider pairing it with the famous, award-winning documentary on the Carthusians of Le Grande Chartreuse: Into Great Silence, all 2:41 on YouTube. I watched this film in the theater when it came out in 2007 and I was in graduate school, taking an independent study course on the English Carthusians along with my friend Andrew Kraebel and directed by Prof. Jessica Brantley. That same year Jessica's book, Reading in the Wilderness: Private Devotion and Public Performance in Late Medieval England came out; I clearly remember running into her at the Yale English department mailboxes when she received the copy of her monograph and laid eyes on it for the first time. She was so excited - it's a beautiful volume.
Into Great Silence depicts the Carthusian monastic practice nearly unchanged from when Methley was in the order five hundred years ago. In that way it's an unnervingly accurate portrayal of a rare way of life that has almost died out.
Of course accompany both book and film with a nice glass of Chartreuse, the famous green Carthusian liqueur.
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