Author Guide · Medieval Mysticism
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On 8 May 1373 a woman in Norwich, about thirty years old and seriously ill, saw a series of sixteen visions of Christ’s suffering and of God’s love. She recovered, wrote down what she had seen, and spent the next decades, much of them as an anchoress enclosed in a cell at St Julian’s Church, working out what it meant. Her real name is not known. Her account survives in two versions, a short one of about 11,000 words and a long one of about 63,500, and it is the earliest surviving writing in English attributed to a woman. Its best-known line, “all shall be well”, reached T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. This guide covers her 8 key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 8 key texts and editions · c. 1373–2015 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Julian of Norwich wrote one work in two versions: the Short Text, A Vision Showed to a Devout Woman (c. 1373), and the Long Text, A Revelation of Love (c. 1390s–1410s), known since 1670 as Revelations of Divine Love. Start with Elizabeth Spearing’s Penguin Classics translation (1998), which has both texts. Below are the two texts and six key editions, in order, with how they differ.
Where to Start with Julian of Norwich
If you want both texts in modern English
→ Revelations of Divine Love (Penguin) (1998) — the Short Text and the Long Text in one Penguin volume.
If you want her own Middle English
→ The Writings of Julian of Norwich (2006) — both texts, edited from all the manuscripts.
If you want the first, shorter account of the visions
→ A Vision Showed to a Devout Woman (c. 1373).
If you want a free version
→ Warrack’s edition (1901) — Grace Warrack’s 1901 text is on Project Gutenberg.
Julian of Norwich’s 2 Texts and 6 Key Editions, in Order
A Vision Showed to a Devout Woman (the Short Text)
Julian’s first account of the sixteen showings she received in May 1373, probably written soon after she recovered, in 25 chapters and about 11,000 words. It survives in a single manuscript, the Amherst Manuscript in the British Library, copied around 1450. That copy was thought lost until it reappeared in 1910, and Dundas Harford first published it in 1911.
A Revelation of Love (the Long Text)
The same sixteen showings, retold and interpreted at length over decades as an anchoress: begun perhaps in the early 1390s and probably finished in the 1410s or later, in 86 chapters and about 63,500 words. It develops at length the idea of God, and Christ, as mother. The thirteenth showing, on sin, contains “all shall be well”. Three complete manuscripts survive, one in Paris and two in the British Library’s Sloane collection.
Revelations of Divine Love, edited by Serenus Cressy
The first printed edition of the Long Text, prepared by Serenus de Cressy from the Paris manuscript. It was the first to use the title Revelations of Divine Love, and it was reprinted in 1843, 1864 and 1902.
Revelations of Divine Love, edited by Grace Warrack
Published by Methuen in London as Revelations of Divine Love Recorded by Julian, Anchoress at Norwich, Anno Domini 1373, a version in modernised language from the Sloane manuscript in the British Museum. It is now free on Project Gutenberg.
Showings, translated by Edmund Colledge and James Walsh
A modern English translation of both the Short Text and the Long Text by Edmund Colledge and James Walsh, published by Paulist Press in its Classics of Western Spirituality series.
Revelations of Divine Love, translated by Elizabeth Spearing
The Penguin Classics translation by Elizabeth Spearing, with an introduction and notes by A. C. Spearing. It prints the Short Text, with the visions and Julian’s first response to them, and then the Long Text, written some twenty years later, with its more developed theology, so the two can be read and compared in one volume.
The Writings of Julian of Norwich, edited by Nicholas Watson and Jacqueline Jenkins
A new edition of both texts in Middle English, titled A Vision Showed to a Devout Woman and A Revelation of Love, published by Penn State University Press with Brepols in the Brepols Medieval Women Series. The editors combine readings from all the surviving manuscripts, and print the Short Text beneath the Long Text so the changes can be followed, with notes and an introduction; 488 pages.
Revelations of Divine Love, translated by Barry Windeatt
A modern English translation by the medievalist Barry Windeatt in the Oxford World’s Classics series, with an introduction and notes. Windeatt is also the scholar who suggests that Julian was born in late 1342.
In What Order to Read Julian of Norwich
Julian wrote the same story twice. The Short Text is the earlier and more immediate account of what she saw and felt in May 1373. The Long Text keeps the sixteen showings but adds years of reflection, and is about six times as long.
Most readers start with the Long Text, since it is the book known as Revelations of Divine Love. But because the Short Text is so much shorter, many editions now print both, and reading the Short Text first shows how her thinking grew. The six editions listed here are the main ways the texts have reached readers, from the first printing in 1670 to recent translations. Others include Henry Collins’s version (1877), Roger Hudleston’s (1927), Marion Glasscoe’s edition (1976, revised 1989), and versions by Frances Beer (1998), Elisabeth Dutton (2010) and Mirabai Starr (2013).
A reading path
1. The Short Text, in Elizabeth Spearing’s Penguin translation (1998)
2. The Long Text, in the same volume
3. Grace Warrack’s version (1901), for the English most twentieth-century readers knew
4. Both texts in Middle English, in Watson and Jenkins (2006)
The years · 1343–2023
Quick facts about Julian of Norwich
- Known for
- Writing Revelations of Divine Love, the earliest surviving book in English attributed to a woman, with its picture of God as love and as mother and its promise that “all shall be well”.
- 1343
- Born, c. 1343
- 1373
- Sixteen visions, 8–13 May, the source of A Revelation of Love
- 1670
- Serenus Cressy prints the Long Text
- 1911
- The Short Text is published for the first time
- 2023
- 650th anniversary of the visions
- Born
- c. 1343; her real name is unknown
- Died
- After 1416, in Norwich
- Visions
- 8 May 1373, aged about 30, during a severe illness; she recovered on 13 May
- Life
- An anchoress, enclosed in a cell at St Julian’s Church, Norwich, from at least the 1390s; four wills between 1394 and 1416 leave money to her
- Works
- One work in two versions: the Short Text (25 chapters) and the Long Text (86 chapters)
- Times
- She lived through the Black Death in Norwich and the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381
- Remembered
- 8 May, in the Church of England and the Episcopal Church; she has never been canonised
The red mark is 1373, the year of the sixteen visions that she wrote down in the Short Text and reworked for decades in the Long Text.
How Julian of Norwich Wrote: Showings, Questions and Revision
Julian writes as a witness. Each of the sixteen showings starts with something she saw, heard or understood on her sickbed, and then she says what she took from it. In one of the best-known passages she sees a thing the size of a hazelnut lying in the palm of her hand, and is told “It is all that is made”; she draws three things from it: that God made it, that God loves it, and that God keeps it.
She also writes as someone asking questions, and says so. Her hardest one is why God allowed sin at all, and the answer she is given in the thirteenth showing, that sin was necessary but “all shall be well”, is the centre of the longest showing, which runs to thirteen chapters in the Long Text. Her best-known image, God and Christ as mother, grows out of the same patient working through.
Above all she revised. The Long Text is about six times the length of the Short Text, and the difference is the work of twenty years or more of reflection in her cell: the Short Text’s 25 chapters become 86, and the visions are surrounded by a developed theology of love. Reading the two together, as most modern editions allow, shows a writer thinking on the page across most of her life.
Frequently asked questions about Julian of Norwich’s books
How many books has Julian of Norwich written?
One work, in two versions: the Short Text, A Vision Showed to a Devout Woman, of 25 chapters and about 11,000 words, and the Long Text, A Revelation of Love, of 86 chapters and about 63,500 words. The Long Text is the book usually called Revelations of Divine Love. This page lists the two texts and six key editions.
What are Julian of Norwich’s books in order?
The Short Text (c. 1373), probably written soon after her visions, then the Long Text, begun perhaps in the early 1390s and probably finished in the 1410s or later. The key editions on this page are Cressy (1670), Warrack (1901), Colledge and Walsh’s Showings (1978), Spearing for Penguin (1998), Watson and Jenkins (2006) and Windeatt for Oxford (2015).
Where should I start with Julian of Norwich?
With Elizabeth Spearing’s Penguin Classics translation (1998), which has both the Short Text and the Long Text in modern English. Read the Short Text first: it is brief, and it makes the later additions easier to see.
What is Julian of Norwich’s most famous book?
Revelations of Divine Love, the Long Text of her visions, first printed under that title by Serenus Cressy in 1670. Its most quoted words are “all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well”.
What is the difference between the Short Text and the Long Text?
The Short Text is the earlier account of the sixteen showings and her first response to them. The Long Text, written over many years afterwards, is about six times as long: it keeps the visions but adds long reflection and a fuller theology, including the idea of God as mother. The Short Text survives in one manuscript, the Long Text in three complete ones.
Was Julian of Norwich the first woman to write a book in English?
Her work is the earliest surviving writing in English known to be by a woman. It is also the only surviving English writing by an anchoress. Margery Kempe, who visited Julian for advice, wrote her Book later.
Where does “all shall be well” come from?
From the thirteenth showing of the Long Text, chapter 27, where Julian asks why God allowed sin and is told that sin was necessary but that “all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well”. T. S. Eliot used the line in “Little Gidding”, part of his Four Quartets.
Is Julian of Norwich a saint?
She has never been formally canonised. The Church of England and the Episcopal Church remember her on 8 May, and Pope Benedict XVI spoke about her at a General Audience on 1 December 2010.
Did Julian of Norwich meet Margery Kempe?
Yes, according to The Book of Margery Kempe, which describes Kempe visiting Julian in Norwich for spiritual advice, probably around 1413. It is one of the few records of Julian by someone who met her.
What is an anchoress?
A woman who chose to be enclosed for life in a cell attached to a church, to pray. Julian was an anchoress at St Julian’s Church in Norwich from at least the 1390s; wills from 1394 to 1416 leave her money. The church was destroyed in the Norwich Blitz in June 1942 and rebuilt after the war.
Footnotes
- Julian of Norwich — Wikipedia
- Revelations of Divine Love — Wikipedia
- The Writings of Julian of Norwich — Penn State University Press
- Revelations of Divine Love (Penguin Classics) — Garratt Publishing
- Revelations of Divine Love, ed. Grace Warrack (1901) — Project Gutenberg
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”
— Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love, chapter 27, in Grace Warrack’s version (1901)
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