"How good it is to be alone"? Sociability, Solitude and Medieval English Anchoritism

The article examines the importance of the ideal of solitude for anchoritic guidance from c. 1162 to c. 1450. It reveals that solitude is ideal in transition as it is textually constructed in the anchoritic guidance writing tradition. Despite the continued commitment to solitude, it states almost all the later medieval anchoritic guides place their recluses in an emergently social role.