The publication of this volume of essays is a milestone in Old English studies. It is the first collection to examine this literature from a feminist perspective. Although the contributors represent a plurality of approaches and positions, they share a common objective: to reassess women as women, as they actually appear in the laws, in works written by women, and in canonical literature. The essays address, correct, and round out the nineteenth-century Anglo-Saxon critical tradition and begin fresh exploration of the women in Old English literature.

The subjects discussed fall into...