The Court of Sapience ed. by E. Ruth Harvey (review)

HUMANITIES 91 Studies? The older generation, of course, is well represented here, contemporaries of Wickens at Toronto and abroad: Lewis from Princeton and Rosenthal from Cambridge. Two of the contributors (Elwell-Sutton and Hourani) died while the collection was being prepared for the press. A strong contingent of younger colleagues is also well represented here: Marmura and Subtelny have contributed papers which stand as examples in their respective fields (while Savory and Birnbaum, also colleagues at Toronto, have contributed their editorial skills). But it is especially heartening to note here the distinguished contributions by recent Toronto graduates, McAuliffe, Sawa, and Wasserstrom. (Another recent gradu- 'ate, Agius, has acted as editor.) The range and quality of these contributions attest to the high standard of scholarship established by Michael Wickens. The participation of his contemporaries in this Festschrift shows clearly that Wickens belongs to the international elite of Islamic Studies. The contributions of distinguished colleagues at the University of Toronto attest to the strength of the department which Wickens has established. But especially to be noted here is the brilliance of the younger scholars who have all benefited, in one way or another, from the teaching and scholarship of Michael Wickens. It would be gratifying if the reviewer could end by noting that all these young scholars were firmly established in academic careers, perhaps one or two of them even at the University of Toronto. We must hope that the enterprise begun under Wickens's leadership and now established at the University of Toronto for almost a generation will not founder for want of support at home and opportunities abroad for distinguished graduates. Certainly the present Festschrift offers eloquent testimony to the strength of the discipline; as such, this collection of studies is a most appropriate and tangible token of respect to the scholar to whom it is dedicated. (JOHN CORBETI) E. Ruth Harvey, editor. The Court of Sapience Toronto Medieval Texts and Translations. General editor Brian Merrilees. University of Toronto Press. xlv, 226, $35.00 To encounter specula of everything known and thought in the medieval world is not unusual: handbooks to knowledge had been appearing regularly at least since Isidore of Seville's Etymologiae, and the fifteenth century marked the height of their translation into the vernacular. But to fmd one elaborately allegorized and sustained throughout 339 rhyme royal stanzas (2373 lines) is unusual. The Court of Sapience provides a striking fulfIlment of a very long medieval tradition. Rarely does their didactic purpose allow these works to rise to any literary heights. In Court, however, 'fruit and chaff' are balanced to provide didactic allegory equal (in my opinion) to Patience or Purity. The narrative device of an ignorant dreamer who must be instructed and the elaborate metaphors of dream landscapes are well sustained throughout the many lines ofelegant verse. Indeed, Caxton'sca 1483 edmon of the poem, Wynkyn de Worde's reprint (1510), and Stephen Hawes's imitations in The Example of Virtue and The Pastime of Pleasure (1503-6) all serve to indicate the esteem in which it was held by contemporary readers. Making such a work accessible to modern readers constitutes one of the chief values of Professor Harvey's recent edition. The second in the Toronto Medieval Texts and Translations series, it sustains the level of scholarship, sensible editorial principles, typographical accuracy, and aesthetics of format initiated by Alan Manning's edition of The Argentaye Tract. The editor's introduction establishes a hierarchy of witnesses in three manuscripts (British Library, Harley 2251; Trinity College, Cambridge , R. 3. 21; and Columbia University Library, Plimpton 256) and two early printed editions (Caxton, STC 17015; and Wynkyn de Worde, STC 17016). She dismisses a fourth extantmanuscript as worthless towards the establishment of a text (British Library, Additional 29729 is simply a copy of the first printed edition) and expresses similar doubt about the four stanzas (lines '97-203, 218-24, 365-78) printed as part of a 'Ballade' in John Stowe's 1561 edition of Chaucer's works. The only other edition of Court, published by Robert Spindler in 1927, included these dubious verses in Stowe, used the Trinity manuscript as copy-text, but did not include the Plimpton MS...