The Cambridge companion to Old English literature (review)

128 Reviews in a stylized context, it may still seem too far removed from the urgencies of the plot. Dessen's method is to describe what has been done with certain crucial scenes in a number of post-1955 productions. He concentrates on three: the Brook/Olivier R.S.C. version, thetelevisionfilm directed by Jane HoweU for the B.B.C., and Deborah Warner's 1987 production, also for the R.S.C., with Brian Cox as Titus. Directorial choices at key points and their effects are described, showing that both Brook's stylization of the honor and Howell's exploitation of it through the realistic medium of television involved considerable cutting and reananging. Not only were these versions very different from each other, they were also some way from what Shakespeare wrote. By contrast Dessen argues, Warner and her cast 'trusted' the play and thetextand so were able to explore and reveal its possibilities, showing not only that it is performable but also that so treated, it has a complexity and coherence that other productions miss. This may only mean that Dessen agrees with Warner's reading but it does allow him to make more generally pertinent critical comments on the play as well as describe its recent stagings. That is something of a bonus for the general reader, not so interested in the detailed description of productions. So also is the fascinating picture which emerges of the straggle that actors, directors, and reviewers have had in accommodating their twentiethcentury sensibilities, nurtured on real honor, to the spectacle of rape, mutilation, and murder presented on a stage. Derick R. C. Marsh Emeritus Professor of English La Trobe University Godden, Malcolm, and Michael Lapidge, eds, The Cambridge companion to Old English literature, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1991; cloth; pp. xvi, 298; 2 maps; R.R.P. AUS$99.00. This elegant and most readable volume is one of the new generation of 'companions' to complex or necessarily diffuse fields of the publication of scholarly endeavour. Unlike the encyclopedic method of many Oxford Companions, this present book comprises a set of fifteen especially commissioned essays. The general purpose is to introduce students seeking 'guidance and orientation' in an unfamiliarfield.Yet such is the quality of the whole that the excellendy organized and indexed collection can be used with profit by those already possessed of more painfully acquired relevant knowledge. The theme, then, is the Old English or related Latin literature known of from the period 600 to 1066. The emphasis, sustained throughout is both on placing the best known texts in their contemporary context and on suggesting ways in which they relate to each other and to the important issues of the time. Reviews 129 Thus significant material on Beowulf appears in at leastfivechapters, and on Bede in four, quite apart from the rich and most up-to-date bibliographies (pp 282-291). Patrick Wormald's opening chapter describes excellently the social and cultural context of Old EngUsh literature. This essay is foUowed by surveys of: the language; the nature of Old English verse (D. Scragg); and of Old English prose (Janet Bately). Subsequent essays treat of relevant Germanic legends, heroic ideals, Christian ethics and of persisting pagan and popular beliefs, hagiography and (continuing) biblical influences. Fred C. Robinson contributes a wise chapter on Beowulf. A most helpful aspect of the whole is that: 'the smaU group of poems which have come to be recognized as the heart of the literary canon are discussed fairly extensively ... : The Dream ofthe Rood; The Battle ofMaldon; The Wanderer and 77* Seafarer' (p. x). The editorial purpose is that the contributors emphasize established interpretations, but this has not precluded intelligent comment on areas of uncertainty or on plausible inferences from meticuloustextualreading. Further, the separate selective research appendices to the several chapters range from the standard works and articles to those at the cutting edge of contemporary scholarship. The other major scholars participating in the symposium include H. Gneuss, Roberta Frank, Katherine O'Keefe, Christine Fell, Barbara Raw, and Joseph B. Trahern, jr. As is well said by Professor Lapidge on the last page of thefinalessay, 'if we would understand the spiritual universe of the Anglo...