Fifteenth-Century LivesIn Fifteenth Century Lives, Karen A. Winstead identifies and explores a major shift in the writing of Middle English saints lives. As she demonstrates, starting in the 1410s and 20s, hagiography became more character oriented, more morally complex, more deeply embedded in history, and more politically and socially engaged. Further, it became more self consciously literary and began to feature women more prominentlyand not only traditional virgin