A love story doesn’t have to be cloying or predictable—and, when read by the right performer, the enchantment can be powerful.

Heartbeat Opera specializes in daring reductions of the classics, and this may be its most implausible undertaking yet.

Producer Sara Zarreh tells the story of Margery Kempe, believed to be the first woman to write an autobiography in the English language, more than five hundred years ago.