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226 Short Notices family life had a profound influence on their roles as readers, owners and patrons of books. Julia Boffey discusses the degree of literacy possessed by medieval w o m e n and Ceridwen Lloyd-Morgan reviews women's literature in medieval Wales. Reinforced with a chronology of events before 1150 at the beginning of the edition and containing an extensive bibliographical guide, this is is a thought-provoking, encouraging and accessible work. Caroline Thompson Publications Unit University of Western Australia Newman, Barbara, Sister of Wisdom. St. Hildegard's Theology of the Feminin a N e w Preface, Bibliography and Discography, Berkeley and Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1997 (first printed 1987); paper; pp. xxiv, 305; 14 b / w illustrations; R.R.P. U S $14.95. The reprinting of a paperback version of Barbara Newman's study of Hildegard's theology of the feminine is a welcome event. As she remarks in a new preface to the volume, serious scholarly attention to Hildegard was still in its infancy when it was first published in 1987. Much has changed in the intervening decade. In the late 1980s, Hildegard's name was still often associated with a string of popular publications inspired by Matthew Fox and his particular theological perspective, known as creation theology. Since then, more scholarly research into Hildegard's writings has proceeded apace. Critical editions have appeared in Corpus Christianorum of all of her major treatises. Some good new translations have appeared, although others are still needed. Newman's study of Hildegard's theology was a ground breaking venture because it combined little known German scholarship about medieval spiritual traditions with concerns shaped by more recent preoccupations with the role of gender in shaping religious thought. To her credit, N e w m a n remains rigorously historical in her focus, avoiding the temptation to turn Hildegard into some late twentieth-century superwoman, while at the same time recognising the originality of her interest in feminine imagery. There is a tension within this book, perhaps never fully resolved, between historical concern and theological focus. Newman's central theme, that Hildegard's thought is to be situated within an ancient tradition of sapiential theology that resurfaces in some contemporary celebration of 'the feminine divine', is not one that has been taken up in subsequent scholarship. It is far from clear that belief in the feminine personification of wisdom constitutes a distinct tradition of theological reflection. Her argument against Matthew Fox that Hildegard's theology is rooted in traditional patterns of thought has the weight of scholarship behind her, although it sometimes threatens to replace one Short Notices 227 contemporary theology with another. Yet her thesis that Hildegard did give particular attention to feminine imagery in constructing her vision of the world is still an important one, distinct from those comments which suggest that there exists a distinct 'sapiential tradition' in Christian theology. Her close attention to little known spiritual and liturgical traditions has the great value of drawing attentiontothe extent to which this w o m a n found inspiration for a very original vision of the world in currents of thought which have long been glossed over. Perhaps in the process of engaging in a campaign to replace creation theology with a theology of the feminine, there is a tendency to play down the central role for Hildegard of the living light and the dynamic life of both God and creation. By looking at a range of feminine images in her writing, N e w m a n provides a way of looking at Hildegard's thought, but it may not be the only way. Constant C. Mews Department of History Monash University Power, Eileen, Medieval Women, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, Canto, 1997; paper; pp. xxviii, 104; R.R.P. AUS$15.95. This very readable book is a curiosity, in that Eileen Power never wro book on medieval w o m e n which she intended. Power died in 1940, and her husband and colleague, Michael Postan, collected the texts of lectures which she gave on relevant topics and added notes and a bibliography. This he published in 1975. A substantial eighteen page biographical...

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