Abstract

Traditionally, the feminist movement in England is dated at the threshold of the eighteenth century. A close reading of The Book of Margery Kempe has revealed irrefutable evidence of much earlier roots. To her reputation as a minor mystic and the author of the first autobiography in the English language can be added a greater claim. The Book, Margery Kempe's record of her struggle for self-definition, demands inclusion among the serious contributions to feminist literature.