Classics, Medieval & Renaissance 2012 - University of Toronto ...

LITERATURE
Old English Literature and the Old Testament
NEW
Edited by Michael Fox and Manish Sharma
It would be difficult to overestimate the importance
of the Bible in the medieval world. For the Anglo-
Saxons, literary culture emerged from sustained
and intensive biblical study. Though the Old
Testament was only partially translated into Old
English, recent studies have shown how completely
interconnected the Anglo-Latin and Old English
literary traditions are.
Old English Literature and the Old Testament
considers the importance of the Old Testament
from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, from
comparative to intertextual and historical. Though
the essays focus on individual works, authors, or
trends, including the Interrogationes Sigewulfi,
Genesis A, and Daniel, each ultimately speaks to the
vernacular corpus as a whole, suggesting approaches
and methodologies for further study.
Michael Fox is an associate professor in the Department
of English at the University of Alberta. Manish
Sharma is an associate professor in the Department
of English at Concordia University.
(Toronto Anglo-Saxon Series)
Approx. 400 pp / 3 illustrations / 6 x 9 / February 2012
Cloth 978-0-8020-9854-2 $80.00 (£50.00)
Anglo-Saxon Psychologies in the Vernacular
and Latin Traditions
Leslie Lockett
Old English verse and prose depict the human mind
as a corporeal entity located in the chest cavity,
susceptible to spatial and thermal changes corresponding
to psychological states. While readers
usually assume the metaphorical nature of such
literary images, Leslie Lockett argues in this book that
these depictions usually served as literal representations
of Anglo-Saxon folk psychology. Lockett
demonstrates that the Platonist-Christian theory of
the incorporeal mind was known to very few Anglo-
Saxons throughout most of the period, while the
concept of the mind-in-the-heart remained widespread.
Leslie Lockett is an assistant professor in the
Department of English at The Ohio State University.
‘Sure to become a standard work in the field, Anglo-
Saxon Psychologies in the Vernacular and Latin
Traditions is one of the most original and learned
discussions of Anglo-Saxon literature of the past
generation.’
Michael Lapidge, Cambridge University
(Toronto Anglo-Saxon Series)
472 pp / 6 x 9 / 2011
Cloth 978-1-4426-4217-1 $85.00 (£59.99)
On the Aesthetics of Beowulf
and Other Old English Poems
Edited by John M. Hill
While there is an apparent consensus by scholars on
a core of poems considered to be exceptional
literary achievements – Beowulf, Judith, the Vercelli
book – there has been little systematic investigation
of the basis for these appraisals. With new essays
on rhetoric, wordplay, metre, structure, irony, form,
psychology, ethos, and reader response, this volume
significantly advances our understanding not only
of aesthetics and Old English poetry, but also of Old
English attitudes towards literature as an art form.
John M. Hill is a professor in the Department of
English at the U.S. Naval Academy.
‘Drawing on a diverse range of theoretical and
methodological approaches reflecting current
trends in North American Old English scholarship,
[this volume] raises important questions about
authorship, provenance and poetic technique.’
Francis Leneghan, The Review of English Studies
320 pp / 7 figures; 5 tables / 6 x 9 / 2010
Cloth 978-0-8020-9944-0 $65.00 (£45.99)
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