ABSTRACT
Transgressive language, which creates such complex audience responses in the biblical plays, also directs the responses of spectators to the three fifteenth-century morality plays The Castle of Perseverance, Wisdom, and Mankind, known as the Macro plays. These plays use transgressive language as one means by which they instruct audiences to recognize and avoid temptation, to live a virtuous Christian life. This chapter illustrates the diversity and complexity of transgressive language in medieval didactic drama. It looks at the areas of apparent similarity between the Macro plays and the biblical plays before discussing differences between the moralities: first, in the way transgressive language is used in them to create characterizations and signal spiritual change. Second, the use of that language to address their specific social topics; and third, the contribution transgressive language makes to the didactic purpose of each play. Similarities and variations in transgressive language are described in this chapter.
