Chapter 1
- Kempe opens her story with her marriage at age 20 to a dude named John. She becomes pregnant immediately—and is very, very sick throughout the entire pregnancy.
- Soon after childbirth, Kempe fears that she will die. She has a sin on her conscience and asks for a priest to come to her so that she can confess.
- The priest appears, but he really does no good for Kempe. The moment she begins to loosen up and tell of her big sin, he rebukes her—and she clams up.
- So much for that. Now Kempe, ill and falling prey to postpartum depression, feels that she will die and go straight to hell because she has a mortal sin on her soul.
- As a result, Kempe "went out of her mind" and is tortured by spirits for about six months.
- Kempe describes these torments in detail: there are devils threatening her, pawing her, calling for her to renounce Christ—which she does.
- Kempe rages against her husband and friends and wants to be as wicked as possible during this time.
- The climax of this madness comes when Kempe bites her own hand to keep from killing herself, leaving a lifelong mark there. She has to be forcibly restrained by her keepers.
- Christ appears to Kempe as a handsome gentleman in purple robes and has a good chat with her.
- Kempe then returns to herself and takes up her responsibilities as wife and mother, much to the chagrin of her household help.
- Kempe does mention that her husband is a good fellow through all of this, and he immediately trusts her with her old duties again when she becomes well.
- From that time on, Kempe is a capable person—but she doesn't yet comprehend the effect that her conversation with Christ will have.
Chapter 2
- So Kempe has been saved by Christ, but she doesn't get it yet. She still suffers from pride.
- In particular, Kempe's a clothes snob. She likes to be dressed in the height of late medieval fashion, and she gets peeved if the other ladies of the 'burgh look better than she does.
- Kempe's husband tells her to chill out, but she cuts him down by saying that she came from a better family than he did. Burn.
- Kempe's worried a lot about outward appearances and having enough moolah to keep up her habits, so she takes up brewing to earn more.
- Things don't go so well. The beer always falls flat, and then Kempe's workers are ashamed of her bad luck. They pack up and leave, and the business folds.
- Kempe starts to understand: God had punished her before with illness, and now he's punishing her with the loss of her "goods." Maybe he's trying to tell her something.
- So Kempe apologizes to her husband for not following his advice and vows to be a more humble, less greedy person.
- But Kempe does decide to give business one more try. This time, she buys a mill and hires a miller to drive the horses and grind people's grains into flour.
- Guess what happens next? Yup. The horses refuse to turn the mill. The miller loses interest and leaves his post, so Kempe has now achieved failed business #2.
- Rumors begin to fly that Kempe is being punished by God. No one will serve her, so her enterprises don't succeed.
- Spiritual men say that Kempe is being called from the pursuits of the world to focus on Christ. She finally takes the hint and physically punishes herself for her disobedience to God's call.
Chapter 3
- Now Kempe's encounters with the divine start for real. She hears beautiful music as she lies in bed with her husband, and she realizes that it is the sound of heaven. It sounds like a party up there.
- This makes Kempe weep with longing whenever she hears music—because she cannot take her mind off the joy that is in heaven.
- Kempe also can't stop talking about how great it is in heaven. Combined with her tears and sobbing, she becomes pretty unpopular. Her neighbors tell her to stop talking about things she can't know about.
- Another problem? After her conversion experience, Kempe no longer wants to have sex with her husband. She knows she kinda has to "pay the debt of matrimony," but the thought of it disgusts her.
- Yeah, well, John won't have any of that. He figures that Kempe is right that it would be good to punish themselves for love of God—just not quite yet.
- So things, uh, resume for a while. John is waiting for a "sign."
- Three or four years later, Kempe tells us, John makes a vow of chastity. She also promises to tell us more about this later.
- Kempe talks about the other "bodily penances" she does to please God, including fasting, going to confession several times a day, and going to church at all hours of the night.
- Kempe also wears a hair shirt under her clothes, even while she's pregnant, to atone for her sins. She weeps and sobs a whole lot—so much so that people say she's faking it.
- But Kempe has a single-minded goal: to get to that sweet music and happiness in heaven.
Chapter 4
- Remember that Kempe is not able to tell her story in chronological order: she's telling us what is most important thematically.
- So now we're back to the beginning of Kempe's penitential life, when she was living in a period of peace for about two years.
- Things go so well for Kempe that she begins to think she's pretty awesome: good at fasting, doing penance, etc. She feels like Christ should really love her a lot for her efforts.
- But Christ has other ideas. Kempe begins to feel tempted by "lechery," or lust.
- And not for her husband, either. Right on cue, a male friend of Kempe's tells her that he will have his way with her, whether she likes it or not.
- Kempe thinks this friend is for real, so she shows up at the time and place he designated. She pretty much resigns herself to this infidelity, because she thinks he will take what he wants at some point, anyway, so why not now?
- When Kempe and this dude meet, the dude acts like he never propositioned her at all. Kempe is perplexed and in despair. Now she is burning with desire for this guy—against her will and against her spiritual goals.
- Sure, Kempe could "satisfy her lust" by having sex with her husband, but the idea sickens her. So she goes back to the man and asks if he will have her. He refuses her outright. Apparently, he was just trying to test her. Whatever, dude.
- Kempe hits rock bottom. She is humiliated and feels that she has failed in her penitential life. She despairs of God's love and grace.
- But Kempe picks herself up by her bootstraps and goes to confession. A lot. And she cries. A lot.
- Still, Kempe feels really far away from God's love and can't figure out why he would let such a thing happen to her.
Chapter 5
- Things can't continue like this for Kempe. Just before Christmas Day, she has a conversation with J. C. himself.
- J. C. gives Kempe a valuable gift: reassurance that she will come to heaven one day, and that he will never abandon her in her trials on earth.
- Christ also gives Kempe some very specific directions on how to proceed in her spiritual life. First, she has to take off the hair shirt; he will give her a "hair shirt on her heart." Ew.
- And here's the part Kempe really won't like: she has to give up eating meat. The only meat she gets from now on is Christ's body, in the form of the Eucharist.
- Jesus also directs Kempe's prayers. Kempe is allowed to pray (formal prayers) for part of the day, but she must now devote herself to contemplation: lying still and communing with God.
- Kempe is to take the insights she gains from such direct conversations to a Dominican anchorite in Lynn, who will discuss her revelations with her.
- Kempe makes a visit to this anchorite immediately and tells him all about her conversation with Christ.
- The anchorite is mighty impressed and tells Kempe that she is "sucking from Christ's breast"—an image used by another mystic, Julian of Norwich.
- The anchorite promises to help Kempe figure out if her revelations are from God or the devil.