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Clifford Davidson, Martin W. Walsh, Ton J. Broos, eds. Everyman and Its Dutch Original, Elckerlijc. TEAMS, Middle English Texts Series. Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 2007. Pp. vii + 104. $13.00.
That Everyman's story has been, and still is, all dungs to all men is evident from the many guises in which this tale was disseminated in Western European literature from the late Middle Ages onwards. It can in fact be traced back even to earlier, non-Christian models and variations. The Dutch Elckerlijc appeared in print in the late fifteenth century and soon translations and adaptations followed. Everyman was published between 1510 and 1535 in the Low Countries and Germany both in the vernacular and in Latin, the latter of which was used as school drama. The translation and adaptation of me Dutch text for me English market demonstrates that, notwithstanding the differences in style and presentation of the two texts, the subject matter was of interest to readers and audiences on both sides of the Channel. And how could it be otherwise: Elckerlijc/Everyman is set against a background shaped by contemporary reality, a mercantile society in which time is money and keeping ahead of the game is not always compatible with the best moral practice. Into this environment the protagonist is brought up short against the values of a different reality (life after life on earth) and found woefully unprepared and disbelieving. The subsequent process of being stripped of all that one holds dear and considers important is painful and frightening.lt is however precisely the change necessary to think of Everyman's impending journey not as an end but as a beginning (as something that ought to have been calculated in the whole journey of life), and this is poignandy portrayed. The author and the adaptor/translator bring this process "to life" for their intended audience and readership by making use of various venerable traditions of representation of this life-to-death pilgrimage.
Although the editors' focus is on Everyman, they pay due attention to the original text Elckerlijc, its textual history, its dissemination in Latin and in German, its use by Catholic as well as Protestant adaptors and translators, and its translation into a text deemed suitable for an English audience. Pleasingly, the Dutch text is included in...