The Anglo-Saxons: Synthesis and Achievement ed. by J. Douglas Woods and David A. E. Pelteret

Abstract

R E V I E W S J. Douglas Woods and David A. E. Pelteret, eds., The Anglo-Saxons: Syn­ thesis and Achievement (Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1986). xii, 177. $14.95. It is devoutly to be wished that more conference collections would take their cue from The Anglo-Saxons: Synthesis and Achievement and give us such “harmony and consent of parts” as this volume displays. The “synthesis” of the title operates very neatly to indicate both the nature of the Anglo-Saxon achievement and the realized concept of the collection, all fitly imaged in its cover by Folio 19 2 V from the Book of Durrow. It is a most satisfying volume indeed, with every detail attended to from precise and complete footnoting, to excellent index, and fruitful bibliographical essay. Paet bip god hoc! The remarkable effect of the collected essays, which were originally de­ livered as lectures at Scarborough College, University of Toronto, in 1979, is that although subjects are concerned with highly diverse and varied aspects of the Anglo-Saxon culture, from the question of the Bayeux Tapestry as history or propaganda, to the varied, rich and exuberant domains of Old English literature, there is a truly effective sense of co-operative spirit amongst these ten contributors; and this spirit must have arisen not out of organized, preconcerted thesis but from a conviction in the participants concerning synthesis as the operative principle in Anglo-Saxon culture, which principle in turn gives energy to the collection. There is in most essays a centre, not always highly elaborated but never­ theless striking, that calls attention to the combining process, whether it is the eclectic nature of the Bayeux Tapestry where Aesop’s Fables and William and Harold can “meet neighbourly and mingle without question,” where history and interpretation get on well together (“The Bayeux Tapestry: History or Propaganda?” ) ; or in suggestion that the life of St. Oswine may, by synthetic transfer from martyr to hero, give meaning to Beowulf (“Beo­ wulf, Bede and St. Oswine: The Hero’s Pride in Old English HagiograE n g l is h S t u d ie s in C a n a d a , xni, 3, September 1987 phy” ) . Beowulf is, then, no more guilty of pride than is St. Oswine, is doomed not by the sin of pride but by the tragic problem itself, where the doer must suffer. I find this an interesting but too manufactured synthesis since St. Oswine’s knowledge of the paradise awaiting him certainly reduced the critical nature of his choice between offending God or contravening heroic principle. “Two Early Anglo-Saxon Men: Oswald and Cuthbert” by John Corbett and “The Celtic Church in Anglo-Saxon Times” by Claude Evans read together illustrate the synthetic vision and knowledge required to see the place of Roman and Celtic traditions within the Anglo-Saxon church; the former essay looks at the secular Roman patronal tradition and finds it bom again in the Christian holy man, epitomized in St. Martin of Tours; and the latter essay shows how the Celtic church’s personal concept of penance gave fervour and human depth to the more administratively oriented Roman church. Attention to the Gospel of Nicodemus in “Anglo-Saxon Use of the Apocryphal Gospel” underlines the easy synthesis between canonical and apocryphal in the powerful and popular theme called the Harrowing of Hell and shows most clearly how important is a synthetic eye for us in the twen­ tieth century. The most explicitly “synthetical” essay is “The Image of the Worm. Some Literary Implications of Serpentine Decoration” by Andrew Patenell. Close analysis of The Phoenix makes this an exciting essay and I am tempted to take synthesis where the author did not explicitly take it and say that as in The Dream of the Rood the instrument of crucifixion is hardly to be differentiated from the object of the crucifixion, so in The Phoenix bird and Christ himself seem to become one; the phoenix no longer symbolizes Christ but is Christ, very much in the manner of Hopkins’ windhover. I might note also that in the macaronic conclusion the inter­ lacing is made even more intense by the maintenance...