Old English Literature

This review of the critical reception of Old English literature from 1900 to the present moves beyond a focus on individual literary texts so as to survey the different schools, methods, and assumptions that have shaped the discipline.

• Examines the notable works and authors from the period, including Beowulf, the Venerable Bede, heroic poems, and devotional literature
• Reinforces key perspectives with excerpts from ten critical studies
• Addresses questions of medieval literacy, textuality, and orality, as well as style, gender, genre, and theme
• Embraces the interdisciplinary nature of the field with reference to historical studies, religious studies, anthropology, art history, and more

John D. Niles is the Frederic G. Cassidy Professor of Humanities, Emeritus, at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and Professor Emeritus of English at the University of California, Berkeley. A former President of the International Society of Anglo-Saxonists, he is the author or editor of a dozen books on Old English literature and related topics, including The Idea of Anglo-Saxon England 1066­1901: Remembering, Forgetting, Deciphering, and Renewing the Past (Wiley Blackwell, 2015) and Beowulf: The Poem and Its Tradition (1983).