An examination of how The Book of Psalms shaped medieval thought and helped develop the medieval English literary canon.The Book of Psalms had a profound impact on English literature from the Anglo-Saxon to the late medieval period. This collection examines the various ways in which they shaped medieval English thought and contributed to the emergence of an English literary canon. It brings into dialogue experts on both Old and Middle English literature, thus breaking down the traditional disciplinary binaries of both pre- and post-Conquest English and late medieval and Early Modern, as well as emphasizing the complex and fascinating relationship between Latin and the vernacular languages of England. Its three main themes, translation, adaptation and voice, enable a rich variety of perspectives on the Psalms and medieval English literature to emerge. TAMARA ATKIN is Senior Lecturer in Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Literature at Queen Mary University of London; FRANCIS LENEGHAN is Associate Professor of OldEnglish at The University of Oxford and a Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford Contributors: Daniel Anlezark, Mark Faulkner, Vincent Gillespie, Michael P. Kuczynski, David Lawton, Francis Leneghan, Jane Roberts, Mike Rodman Jones, Elizabeth Solopova, Lynn Staley, Annie Sutherland, Jane Toswell, Katherine Zieman.

Introduction: a Case Study of Psalm 50.1-3 in Old and Middle English - Francis LeneghanSome Anglo-Saxon Psalters and their Glosses - Jane RobertsThe Eadwine Psalter and Twelfth-Century English Vernacular Literary Culture - Mark Faulkner'In eching for the beste': the Fourteenth-Century English Prose Psalter and the Art of Psalm Translation - Annie SutherlandThe Wycliffite Psalms - Elizabeth SolopovaRolle's English Psalter and the Possibilities of Vernacular Scriptural Commentary - Katherine ZiemanMaking the Psalter Sing: the Old English Metrical Psalms, Rhythm and Ruminatio - Francis LeneghanThe Psalms in the Old English Office of Prime - Daniel AnlezarkPsalm Genres in Old English Poetry - M J ToswellArticulating the Psalms in Middle English Alliterative Poetry:Some Passages of Piers Plowman, St Erkenwald and Pearl - Mike Rodman JonesMaidstone's Psalms and the King's Speech - Lynn StaleyThe Songs of the Threshold: Enargeia and the Psalter - Vincent GillespiePsalms as Public Interiorities: Eleanor Hull's Voices - David LawtonVox ecclesiae, vox Christi: the Psalms and Medieval English Ecclesiology - Michael Kuczynski