The Exeter Anthology Of Old English Poetry

‘ . . . a valuable updating of its forebears. Bernard Muir’s painstaking examination of both the manuscript and the enormous amount of scholarship on it has resulted in a wealth of new information alongside the riches of the old. This is a fine and full edition.’
(The Exeter Anthology of Old English Poetry Speculum, April 1997)

‘…vivid, sharp, precise and minutely examinable photographs of the whole Exeter Book. And a privilege it is, too: even if Muir’s editing were nonsense (and it is very far from that), the DVD would make the book available to scholars in a way that preserves the manuscript itself from damage, is an unquestionable improvement on the 1933 facsimile, and allows leisurely and detailed study. The work has the added bonus of a thoroughly competent edition of all the poetic texts and some DVD ‘extras’.

‘We may take the edition first. The DVD incorporates Muir’s book-based edition, bibliography and commentary from the second edition of the Exeter Anthology of Old English Poetry, in two volumes (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2000).’

‘New textual readings based on close reading and examination of the manuscript, and thorough discussion of earlier editions and emendations, make the work an essential resource for the scholar and advanced student.’

‘The facsimile itself is marvellous. There is detailed commentary in the introduction on the physical and structural aspects of the manuscript, its binding, gatherings, prickings, defects and damage, drypoint markings, marginalia, division and organization of contents, handwriting, capitals, punctuation and spellings. The photographs of the manuscript are so good that many of the non-textual features like drypoint markings are visible. There are different views available: verso and recto of the open book, an individual page, or thumbnails of pages of the whole book. Using the cursor and clicking on the magnifier, one can magnify small areas of the manuscript for detailed examination, or drag the magnifier over the width of the page. One can open the edited text alongside the page, click on the line-by-line commentary from the text or from the “hot” areas shown on the manuscript, and access the bibliography. There are selected text readings and recordings of performed Latin chants (for the Advent Lyrics).’

‘…it makes the Exeter Book accessible to scholars in a way that has not been possible before. It is a magnificent achievement.’
(Medieval Review, electronic journal, June 2007)

‘The new electronic edition of the Exeter Book shows to what heights these developments have led, and to what extent a combined textual and visual representation of the manuscript has surplus value when compared to ‘traditional’ text or facsimile editions. To put it in plain words: once I started the DVD I was lost. Completely unaware of my surrounding I spent three hours without noticing that time had passed only to awake to the reality of everyday departmental life by a knock on my door. Bernard Muir and Nick Kennedy have given us a user-friendly, esthetically attractive, and all-encompassing facsimile-cum-edition of the text.

The DVD provides crystal clear images of every page of the manuscript, side by side with the text.’
(Erik Kooper, Newsletter of the European Society for the Study of English, The European English Messenger, Autumn 2008)