Robert D. Stevick Libri

Stevick (English, U. of Washington) analyzes the mathematical proportions of illuminated pages and narrative poems in English and Irish manuscripts from the seventh through the tenth centuries. He finds that illustrators, scribes, book designers, and even poets all drew from the same geometrical and mathematical patterns and proportions. He speculates somewhat on the spiritual significance of the patterns or their origin in specific monastic training, but largely keeps his focus on how the artists worked their craft. Highly illustrated in black and white. Indexed by subject and proportion. Of interest to historians of architecture as well as of art. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.

'A Firstbook of Old English' distills instructional materials developed through forty years of teaching this ancestral form of our language. Uniquely it is shaped by principles of second-language instruction without diluting philology of the past century and a half. The author's 'One Hundred Middle English Lyrics' earlier offered a unique and very successful teaching text. His most recent scholarly publication is 'The Earliest Irish and English Bookarts.' Robert Stevick is now Professor of English Emeritus, University of Washington.