Working with Tradition, Aiming for Reform: Dorlandus’s Perspective on Hagiography

This article examines how the Carthusian Peter Dorlandus (1454–1507) rewrote the material about well-known saints like Joseph of Nazareth, Catherine of Alexandria, Cecilia of Rome, and Francis of Assisi so as to serve in the reformation both of individual believers and of the Church. He experimented with different genres: the traditional hagiographical genre of a vita, a hybrid text between the sermon and the vita, and the dialogue. Saint Joseph is primarily depicted as excelling in his radical intimacy with Christ and as a missionary. Dorlandus puts forward the virgin martyrs as spiritual leaders, for instance, in a dialogue between Cecilia and Francis, in which she teaches him that devotion is about the inner person. This article argues that this connects to the Carthusian faith regarding female visionaries such as Hildegard of Bingen, Catherine of Siena, and Bridget of Sweden as providers of guidance in the crisis of the Church.