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COPYRIGHT 1996 University of Illinois Press
By Frank Tobin. Columbia, S.C.: Camden House, 1995. Pp. xii + $55.95.
The monograph on Mechthild von Magdeburg (ca. 1207- ca. 1282) is published in the series "Literary Criticism in Perspective," one of the aims of which, according to the editors, is to "trace literary scholarship and criticism on major and neglected writers alike, or on a single major work." The series casts a wide net, for its authors wish to address "scholars, students of literature at the graduate and undergraduate level, and the general reader." In the case of Mechthild we are dealing with a "single major work," Das flieBende Licht der Gottheit, which she produced in her native Low German, but which is no longer extant. When scholars refer to her "book," they are in fact referring to a translation into Middle High German. Given Mechthild's relative obscurity--temporally, linguistically, and textually--Frank Tobin wisely prefaces his history and criticism of scholarship with a brief but nevertheless quite informative chapter on her life, the transmission and reception of her book, and the state of editions...
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