Publisher's Synopsis
Somewhere about 1300, in Midland, England, a priest bethought him of the consecrated life and, looking round for a subject, selected the wonderful theme of Guy of Warwick, a choice hero of early England, for his octosyllabic poem - a spiritualized Guy, however, well indoctrinated in the theology of the day. The secular Guy of Warwick romances, as shown by Zupitza in his remarkable edition, bad been among the most abundant and fascinating of the early English middle ages; delightful food for the fancy of many a poet. What more natural than that this Guy, after his marvelous round of ad venture, should, like Faust, have a Part Second to his career - should in deep remorse expiate his offenses against God, and fall in with a benevolent friar able to teach him the discrimination between good and evil?
This is the theme of the remarkable work before us. The old monks who could "illumine a martyrology or curse a crucifix" are here rivaled by a woman who with extensive learning combines indefatigable patience and who overlays a poem of forty or fifty pages with nearly two hundred of commentary. Nor is Dr. Morrill a dry exegete. Enthusiasm glows on every page, and a strenuous personality is apparent between the lines. Urged by the lamented Zupitza (to whom the volume is partly dedicated), she took up the Auchinleck MS. of the "Speculum," once belonging to the father of Johnson's celebrated Boswell, and collated it carefully with six other MSS. This was in 1896. Interruptions occurred to prevent the completion of the work; but now it appears with the magic sesame of the Early English Text Society's seal set on it. It is a rare honor for a woman to be selected to edit one of this Society's texts, but Miss Morrill shows she has well deserved the honor. No German monograph could be more minute and painstaking in its analysis, methods and results. Every possible question connected with the Warwick romances is taken up and exhaustively discussed.
-The Critic, Vol. 31 [1899]
