Janet Schrunk-Ericksen, Reading Old English Biblical Poetry: The Book and the Poem in Junius 11. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2021, pp. 222.

Abstract

Abstract Janet Schrunk-Ericksen (Ph.D., University of Illinois), Professor of English and Acting Chancellor at the University of Minnesota, Morris, has written a worthwhile study of Oxford, Bodleian Library MS Junius 11 and key aspects of the five narrative poems within it. As her title suggests, the five poems might have been considered “the poem”: one poem with multiple parts, by an early reader reading through the book, if proceeding sequentially. Indeed, Schrunk-Eriksen’s book, Reading Old English Biblical Poetry, explores how early readers may have approached and understood Junius 11, its sequential contents, and its representation of God’s divine power. She pays careful attention to the physical codex as well as to close readings of the poems. Her work emerges alongside an on-going revival of academic interest in how to read medieval manuscripts, which is similarly demonstrated by Elaine Traherne’s study, Perceptions of Medieval Manuscripts: The Phenomenal Book (Oxford, 2022) and Carl Kears, MS Junius 11 and its Poetry (Boydell & Brewer, 2022).