For Teachers

The Book of the Maidservant

Questions for Discussion

--Johanna lives in the 15th century, almost 600 years ago. What details of 15th-century life appeal to you? What would you dislike the most?

--Johanna doesn’t know how to read or write. Neither does her mistress, Margery Kempe. What effect does this have on their lives? How would Johanna’s life be different if she were literate?

--Johanna carries practical items such as her flint, some food, and extra pins for her mistress’s veil in her scrip, the leather pouch she wears at her belt. She also carries treasures such as the pebble from the river where she grew up and a blue glass bead she finds on the journey. What role do these items play in her story? What would you put in your scrip if you were going on a pilgrimage?

--One of Johanna’s duties is to build fires. What role do fires (and fire-building) play in the story?

--In what ways are kitchens and food-preparation important to Johanna and her story?

--What do you think will happen to Johanna after the end of the novel? What details in the story lead you to that conclusion?

--Why is each of the travelers going on the journey? Who, among the pilgrims, is the most changed by the pilgrimage? In what ways? How is Johanna’s outlook on life affected by her pilgrimage? In what ways does she change? In what ways does she stay the same?

Classroom Projects

--If you have read the General Prologue to The Canterbury Tales, you know that a group of 14th-century pilgrims journeys to the shrine to St. Thomas à Becket in Canterbury, England. Compare the travelers on Johanna’s journey to Chaucer’s pilgrims. You might look particularly at Chaucer’s Clerk (student), his merchant, and his Wife of Bath.

--Chaucer includes teenaged boys (such as the clerk and the squire) among his pilgrims, but no teenaged girls. If Johanna had been one of his pilgrims, how might he have described her in his General Prologue? What sort of tale might he have given her to tell? Plan out and write Johanna’s Tale.

--During the Middle Ages, people went on pilgrimages to many shrines, and at each one, they could collect a metal badge. For example, pilgrims to the shrine of St. James in Compostella, Spain, got badges shaped like a scallop shell. Often, people wore their badges on their hats to show where they had been. Do some research to see if you can discover what other kinds of badges medieval pilgrims got. Where were some of the most important shrines?

--Choose a character in the novel you would like to know more about. Make up a story about that person, inventing a scene we don’t see in the novel. What research will you have to do in order to give accurate details?

--Retell a scene that’s already in the novel, from the point of view of a different character. How much does the scene change, and why?

--Visit the website, “Mapping Margery Kempe,” at http://www.holycross.edu/departments/visarts/projects/kempe/ to find out more about life in 15th-century England. Choose a character from the novel, or make one up, and using research from the website, write a day in the life of that character, from sunrise to sunset. What social class is your character, and how much difference does that make to his or her daily life? What kinds of details are you unable to find?

--Another good visual source for medieval life is the 14th-century English manuscript, The Luttrell Psalter. It has pictures of a knight and his family, as well as images of peasants working and playing. Many images from the manuscript are available on the Web. A particularly good site is The British Library’s “Turning the Pages,” which allows viewers to zoom in on images from several pages of the manuscript. http://www.bl.uk/collections/treasures/luttrell/luttrell_broadband.htm