Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw/Die Vielen Gesichter des edlen Räubers (review)

Short Notices Carpenter, Kevin, ed., Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw/Die Vielen Gesichter des edlen Rdubers, Oldenburg, Bibtiotheks und Informationssytem der Universitat Oldenburg, 1995; paper; pp. 303; over 200 illustrations; R.R.P. not known. This book was produced as an accompaniment to an exhibition on the subject of Robin Hood, which toured six European countries between 1995 and 1997. It aims to provide readers of either German or English with a comprehensive survey of the many incarnations of the character and the legend, in a collection of scholarly articles, personal accounts by popular writers, ideas on presenting Robin Hood in the classroom, Robin Hood in film, and more. The second half of the three-hundred page book is a catalogue of the exhibits, a couple of hundred Ulustrations and artefacts of every imaginable kind which are no doubt of interest to viewers of the exhibition, but of limited use otherwise. The book concludes with lists of secondary reading and film material on the subject of Robin Hood. While the book contains some useful and interesting material on the Robin Hood legend and its past and present uses, notably in the articles by writers such as James C. Holt, Stephen Knight and others, i t P A R E R G O N ns 15.1 (July 1997) Short Notices 277 is difficult to escape the feeling that the mix of the material is a real problem. The book interweaves serious and scholarly writing with the tight and personal, but even more strikingly, it juxtaposes material with a very short sheU-tife with articles that serve the more enduring requirements of academic research. This mix creates a disjunction which is intensified by the editor's decision to use both English and German in the first part of the book. M u c h of the material is thus presented twice, and each of the essays is introduced and summarised in the alternate language. One has to question the wisdom of this bilingual approach, especially as it has apparently not been considered necessary in the second part. W h e n combined with variations in type for each of the languages, it is an irritating editorial feature. O n the positive side, the book is generously and interestingly Illustrated with prints, etchings and photographs from all kinds of sources, and in terms of scope and comprehensibitity it should be of value to students of Robin Hood. Philippa Beckerling Department of English University of Western Australia Ganshof, F. L., Feudalism (Medieval Academy Reprints for Teaching 34), Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1996; paper; pp. xviii, 176; R.R.P. US$13.95. 'What is feudalism?' has been the starting-point for m a n y an undergraduate course in medieval European history, and sttil is in many cases today. The two seminal works which always appear on the reading-list for this topic are Marc Bloch's Feudal Society and Francois Ganshof's Feudalism. They are very different books. Bloch offers a marvellously rich and wide-ranging account of feudal institutions and the society in which they were embedded, though his discursive and detailed approach must appear formidable to the n e w undergraduate! Ganshof, in contrast, provides a masterpiece of compression, clearly and succinctly set out, and incorporating extensive evidence with a remarkably light touch. H e is very careful ...