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196 LETTERS IN CANADA 2000 the casual pace of the tale it tells (a frame tale, really, containing scores of stories, innumerable bits of lore, and plenty of poems of various kinds), and the seeming aimlessness of the itineraries of Patrick (listening to Caílte and Oisín, his Fenian colleague, as they share all that they know about the past) and Caílte (alternately regaling Patrick and other listeners with his storytelling , and wandering off to engage in new adventures) all may give the impression of a potpourri with little in the way of authorial agenda or subtext apart from trying to cram as much information as possible into the text. Careful readers of the Acallam, however, know better than to underestimate this text=s nature and aims. As Dooley and Roe point out, the Acallam anachronistically makes extensive and subtle reference to the political scene of the era in which it was composed. Moreover, the very premise of the text B an unlikely encounter between pagan heroes, emerging out of the past like Rip Van Winkle and eager to embrace the new religion once they meet its most famous advocate in Ireland, and St Patrick, the personification of the Christian impact on Irish culture, who with divine sanction commissions the recording of all that these >elders= remember about their heroic world (a process that supposedly resulted in this text) B constitutes a bold defence of the Irish literary establishment, under attack from church reformers in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, as well as a sly strategy for legitimating the introduction of a vast narrative cycle from oral tradition into the mainstream of vernacular literary production, which previously had ignored it. Dooley and Roe=s generally reliable and readable translation of the earliest surviving recension of the Acallam is a welcome successor to previous translations of the whole or parts of the text, most of which are now out of print and out of date. Those readers interested in how medieval Irish literature and society were affected by continental literary trends, such as the rise of romance and notions of chivalry, will find much of interest here, as will those who would like to sample the heroics of Finn mac Cumaill and the other leading figures of the Fenian cycle in a relatively pristine state, long before they became grist for the romantic mill of James Macpherson and other >Celtophilic= writers of the eighteenth and later centuries. The major criticism I have of this publication has to do with its lack of an index. What with the bewildering proliferation of names and details that characterizes the Acallam, it is exceedingly difficult, even for a reader who knows the text well, to navigate through it and find what one is looking for. It is to be fervently hoped that with the next edition of this translation an index will be included. (JOSEPH FALAKY NAGY) Nam-lin Hur. Prayer and Play in Late Tokugawa Japan: Asakusa SensÇji and Edo Society Harvard University Press. xvi, 302. US $40.00 HUMANITIES 197 In Prayer and Play in Late Tokugawa Japan, Nam-lin Hur presents a study of the temple complex of SensÇji, a major sightseeing destination in the Asakusa area of Tokyo. According to tradition it had its origins in the seventh century but came to prominence when it became affiliated with the Tokugawa family. However, it gradually transformed into a temple for commoners and the focus of this work is how in doing so it developed into a popular centre for not only worship, but also play. Although death rituals were a major function of Japanese Buddhism, SensÇji did not conduct such services, and so businesses and entertainment venues were scattered throughout the temple precincts to add to its popularity. But this was not simply a case of crass commercialism to attract worshipers. As Hur notes, the Japanese understanding of the concept of prayer encompasses an eclectic variety of ritual activity, including material exchange for religious services or paraphernalia, and the Japanese notion of >play= implicitly has religious undertones. Thus, Hur notes, >To the common folk, the combination of prayer and play was not odd. Indeed, throughout Japanese religious...

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