Hyunyang Lim.  Pilate’s Special Letter - Writing, Theater, and Spiritual Knowledge in the Digby Mary Magdalene     page(s): 1-20

Abstract

 Focusing on the problem of disinformation represented by Pilate’s special letter to Tiberius in the Digby play of Mary Magdalene, this paper examines how the conspicuous growth of documentary culture in fifteenth-century East Anglia influenced late medieval theatrical productions in this region. Writing is an important theme in the Digby Mary Magdalene because it is unstable and thereby implicitly counters a different idea of the Word, Christ. The emphasis on bodily experience, implicated in the spectacle and concrete images of medieval theater, expresses social anxiety to the spread of writing and written documents, which became increasingly important but susceptible for abuse. By inviting the audience to participate physically in the theatrically reproduced biblical events, the East Anglian drama gives access to the spiritual truths that Pilate’s forged document attempts to manipulate.       
       
Keywords:     The Digby Mary Magdalene, writing, theater, incarnational aesthetic, documentary culture, East Anglia