author
William Langland
Best known as the presumed author of Piers Plowman, he stands at the heart of Middle English literature with a poem that mixes dream vision, social criticism, and spiritual searching. Very little is known for certain about his life, which only adds to the mystery around one of the period's most memorable voices.
2 Audiobooks
The Vision and Creed of Piers Ploughman, Volume 2
by William Langland
The Vision and Creed of Piers Ploughman, Volume 1
by William Langland
About the author
William Langland was a 14th-century English poet and the presumed author of Piers Plowman, a major work of Middle English alliterative verse. Scholars generally place his life around the 1300s, but many details remain uncertain, including exactly when he was born and died.
What has kept his name alive is Piers Plowman, an ambitious allegorical poem that explores faith, justice, corruption, labor, and the moral struggles of everyday life. Its dream-vision form and plainspoken energy helped make it one of the defining literary works of medieval England.
Because so little can be confirmed about Langland himself, readers often meet him mainly through his writing. That sense of mystery has become part of his appeal: a shadowy figure behind a vivid, searching poem that still feels alive with questions about society and conscience.