A History of Old Norse Poetry and Poetics. by Margaret Clunies Ross. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2005. Pp. x + 283. $85.

Until now no one monograph has made the evolution of both poetry and poetics in the "Old Norse" vernacular its focus, and the present book aims to fill that gap. Individual chapters describe the poetic corpus, analyze indigenous terms and genres, document the transmission of poetry, explore poetic aesthetics, trace the impact of Christianity, identify poetological elements in the grammatical treatises, and extend our appreciation of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century poetry. The book is rounded off with a conclusion, which notes directions for future research and contains an appendix on technical terms, a list of works cited, and an index. From this richly detailed, informative, and imaginative treatment, I can take up only a few topics for brief mention.

Anatoly Liberman
University of Minnesota