John the Baptist’s Prayer or The Descent into Hell from the Exeter Book: Text, Translation and Critical Study by M. R. Rambaran-Olm (review)

Book Reviews John the Baptist’s Prayer or The Descent into Hell from the Exeter Book: Text, Translation and Critical Study. By M. R. Rambaran-Olm. Anglo-Saxon Studies 21. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2014. ISBN 978-1-84384-366-5. Pp. x + 252. $99.00. Few Anglo-Saxonists have offered full-length studies of shorter poems from the corpus of Old English literature, and often only the most prominent specimens are considered as the foci of monographs. M. R. Rambaran-Olm provides a stimulating study of a single, shorter Old English poem (totaling 137 lines) from the Exeter Book that has been variously known as the Harrowing of Hell, Descent into Hell, and now John the Baptist’s Prayer. Much of the study revolves around what the author calls ‘‘misreadings of the poem’’ (9)—textual and critical, editorial and analytical. Thus, in her roles as editor, translator, and critic as announced in the title, she supports a major argument about modern receptions of the poem. In addition to an edition, translation, and textual commentary, the volume includes several chapters discussing the poem and contexts, black-and-white photographs throughout, appendices to support the main content, glossary, bibliography, and index. Central to Rambaran-Olm’s argument, and the most convincing feature of this book, is her claim that the theme is a doctrinal reflection on Christian baptism, and her subsequent renaming of the text as John the Baptist’s Prayer. As she argues throughout, and upholds as the main reason for a new edition with commentary, the poem has been largely misinterpreted by previous critics who have focused on the descensus motif rather than taking the whole narrative arc into account in discussing the central theme. While previous critics have paid most attention to the Harrowing, Rambaran-Olm instead argues that the figure of John the Baptist and associations with the Christian rite of baptism should be considered the cornerstone of the poem. Along the way, she makes the argument for viewing the poem in light of Easter baptism, liturgy, and drama, and presents substantial analogues from various cultural media, including Latin and Old English texts, visual arts, and religious observances current in late Anglo-Saxon England. The edited text generally agrees with previous editions by George Philip Krapp and Elliott van Kirk Dobbie in The Exeter Book (ASPR 3, 1936) and Bernard Muir in The Exeter Anthology of Old English Poetry (2nd ed., 2000). Yet Rambaran-Olm incorporates differences in editorial punctuation as well as the addition of macrons Christianity & Literature 2016, Vol. 66(1) 162–190 ! The Author(s) 2016 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/ journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0148333116673284 cal.sagepub.com to indicate vowel lengths, and, like Muir, she supplies speculative readings where the manuscript is damaged. Emendations are supported by justifications in the commentary, including references to previous editors and discussion of digital techniques to recover the text. Especially notable in this regard is Appendix 4, highlighting a critical reconstruction of text on the damaged folio 120r, including a diplomatic transcription of this portion of the poem. As other recent digital endeavors demonstrate, there are undoubtedly benefits to having multiple types of editorial texts together for comparison like this. Also included are images of the damaged folio 120r in its current state as well as a hypothetical reconstruction of the folio before damage using digital methods; close-up images of this reconstruction are provided in the textual commentary to support discussions of editorial interventions. For these methods, Rambaran-Olm is indebted to technology popularized by Kevin Kiernan, which users of the Electronic Beowulf will recognize. There is much here that may be applied to other editorial endeavors, as others have said regarding Kiernan’s work. It is particularly significant to see this type of technology brought to bear in the study of a short and relatively minor poem of the Old English corpus; it is hoped that these techniques will become more widespread in the fields of manuscript studies and textual editing. Rambaran-Olm’s translation deserves notable mention, since few others have appeared in print recently. No doubt the accessibility of having edition and translation side...