THE NOVICE'S TALE

Author's Note

There is often interest in what is true in an historically set story. St. Frideswide's nunnery is fiction. The life the nuns live there is not. Or rather, it is as close to life in a medieval Benedictine nunnery as can be judged from reading about it. Besides the nuns' own surviving documents, many now in print, a rich source of information has been Eileen Power's Medieval English Nunneries. Also invaluable is The Rule of St. Benedict, a humane and generous directive for the cloistered life, available in many translations.

Some doubt may be expressed concerning the accuracy of portraying a woman as independent and strong-minded as Frevisse. Given the popular notion that medieval women were universally oppressed, it may be assumed I have imposed a modern woman into a medieval setting, but judging by extensive reading of documents and studies of late medieval England, there seem to have been a great many strong-minded, independent, capable women who took every advantage their world offered and made the most of it. Along with that, it should be remembered that the vaunted Renaissance and Age of Reason saw a steady stripping away of women's rights and independence. In late medieval England women had more rights -- both legal and social -- than they would have again until the 20th century.

With the idea of oppressed medieval women goes the generally accepted "truth" that nunneries were mostly a way of disposing of unwanted women. Whatever the situation elsewhere, in England such statistics as we possess for nunneries suggest there were either relatively few unwanted women or this was not true. Aside from some large foundations, nunneries tended to be small: eight women, or even less, was usual. Nor do women seem, generally, to have been "shut up" against their will. There were certainly women with a genuine spiritual calling, for whom a nun's life was a free and fulfilling choice. For other women, the nunnery offered a viable alternative to marriage -- a chance to live independent of societal strictures binding on those who chose the usual course in life, as well as in a context rich in the highly valued spirituality of the time. Of course there were women who went into nunneries because they had been told to go and couldn't think of anything else to do with themselves. There have always been -- and are -- women who did what they were told, rather than thinking their lives out for themselves, including marrying when they might rather not.

From an author's point of view, all of that makes for a rich mix of personalities and possibilities. Add the fact that nunneries are corporate entities, ranging from the equivalent of small businesses with only local interests to, as it were, large conglomerates owning diverse properties, and that nuns -- both then or now -- have always taken very active responsibility in the management of their nunneries, and the possibilities for stories burgeon.

As for actual historical facts in The Novice's Tale, Thomas Chaucer is real, with his links by blood to the royal family and his refusal to be drawn into the political tangles of the time. The talk about the French witch Joan of Arc and the siege of Orleans are of course topical, and Lord Moleyns did die in France and his daughter become Chaucer's ward. Regarding the relationship between Queen Katherine and her Welshman, who knew what and when they knew it is unknown, but by late 1431 she had surely borne him at least one child, if not more; and to judge by the official response when her secret did finally come out, it was a secret well worth keeping for as long as possible.

Last, if not least, there is Frevisse's name and how it is pronounced. It is the French version of St. Frideswide, a saint barely known outside the English Midlands, but in France there is a single church dedicated to her and there she is called St. Frevisse. It was from that that Frevisse's wandering parents, a little homesick for their old home, named their daughter. As to pronunciation, Fray-vees' would seem likely, except that she is in England and therefore is more likely called Fray'-viss. I leave it to the reader's preference.