The poet Wace (b. after 1100; d. 1175x83) has long been acknowledged as a figure central to the development of twelfth-century French literature, but his ouevre has been somewhat unevenly studied. His permanent place in the canon was assured by the production of the vastly influential Brut of c. 1155, and this text has received a great deal of attention from scholars in recent years. The Brut is justly celebrated for its pivotal position in the vernacularisation of historiography, and the development of the Arthurian romance. (Particularly worthy of notice are Jean Blacker, Faces of Time; D. H. Green, Beginnings of Medieval Romance; Peter Damien-Grint, New Historians of the Twelfth Century; Michelle R. Warren, History on the Edge; and David Rollo, Historical Fabrication, Ethnic Fable and French Romance.)
However, this interest in the Brut has not, thus far, been matched by attention to Wace's other substantial work, the Roman de Rou (1160-74), which is an altogether more problematic piece, and seems to have been regarded as such even at the time of its writing. The main critical development of recent time has been Elisabeth van Houts' detailed and convincing defence of Wace's credentials as a conscientious historian, which is a strong argument for a wholesale reconsideration of the Rou. Three much shorter religious works are also attributed to Wace, but have attracted little notice; and indeed verifiable knowledge of his life and career is regrettably sparse.
However, thanks to the efforts of a small group of scholars, the bulk of Wace's work has recently become readily accessible to a wide and scholarly audience: both the Roman de Brut and Roman de Rou have been published in editions which print parallel Old French text and modern English translation (Judith Weiss, 2nd edition, Exeter University Press, 2002; Glyn Burgess, Societe Jersiaise, 2002; the translation of the Rou is also available in a more economical paperback from Boydell). This welcome development is a part of the current sense that Wace scholarship is picking up pace; Weiss and Burgess have recently also edited a volume of papers from the 2004 colloquium, Maistre Wace: A Celebration.
Le Saux's book, then, is a timely and necessary contribution to the scholarly moment. It is aptly titled as a "Companion to Wace", for this book will undoubtedly be the first resource for any scholar new to the poet's output, and a reference work in frequent use for those who write about him. The book is designed for ease of reference; it is organised and set out with great discipline, which has myriad advantages for the reader seeking knowledge piecemeal, although one begins to wonder whether such generosity does its author a disservice, as it perhaps discourages a continuous reading.
After a short introduction on Wace's "Life and times", Le Saux divides her work into three sections: the three hagiographies, the Brut, and the Rou. The introduction contains an interesting new suggestion (6):
... The indirect testimony of his surviving works points towardsinfluential patrons. One of these, though unnamed by Wace, isprobably Henry of Blois, Bishop of Winchester and Abbot ofGlastonbury. While there is no indication that this grandpersonage--the grandson of the Conqueror by his daughter Adela--had directly commissioned poems from Wace, the extant works byour poet prior to the Roman de Rou may be seen asreflecting his interests one way or another.
Le Saux outlines various pieces of circumstantial evidence for this theory, and it is certainly possible. However, such ascriptions of patronage are always doubtful, and indeed on the wider question of twelfth-century patronage, recent work by the historian John Gillingham, among others, suggests that modern critics have drastically overestimated the degree to which great magnates and rulers can be associated with literary production. It is also tempting to wonder how useful the identification of patrons, and particularly the speculative identification of patrons, actually is to the understanding of literary texts, whose circumstances of conception, production and reception are necessarily complex and obscure.
Le Saux's handling of Wace's three religious texts is meticulous and thorough. In each case she provides a detailed analysis of the French poet's use of his sources, his thematic and structural concerns, and his poetic skill. This is all essential work, bringing together all that is known on the subject, and no doubt clearing the path for these texts to be properly incorporated into our understanding of Wace's work as a whole.
The section on the Roman de Brut is most valuable for its precise documentation of Wace's use of his sources. Le Saux definitively demonstrates what others have suggested, that the French poet's main source was the so-called First Variant version of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia regum Britanniae, while the earlier Vulgate version was certainly known to him, and used as a supplementary source throughout, to varying degrees. In so doing, she draws attention to the subtle thematic alterations which Wace conferred upon the text, often in expansion of changes initiated by the author of the First Variant.
It is in the section on the more problematic Rou, however, that Le Saux's documentary and descriptive approach comes into its own. Her remarkably light interpretative touch, which renders the book so eminently useful as a work of reference, is exactly what Rou scholarship needs at this moment. The text has inspired a variety of arguments about the causes of its 'failure'--its apparent abandonment by both patron and author--and the reasons for its strange and inconsistent structure. It has been reclaimed as a historical source; and has also been employed as a part of wider arguments about the 'Norman myth', notably in Emily Albu's provocative recent book Normans in their Histories. But there remains the pervasive sense that we have not yet grasped the Roman de Rou; its strangeness remains opaque to us. Le Saux's exhaustive discussion of precisely Wace's decisions with regard to his known sources, his thematic designs, and his poetic structure, provide the definitive groundwork for this poem to be newly tackled. Her clear analysis of the demonstrable tactics of the poem will be an invaluable corrective and balancer for critics with any interpretative agenda.
Le Saux's conclusions are characteristically well-defined, well-supported, and properly cautious. She draws attention above all to Wace's poetic skill, his independence of mind, and his impressive command and employment of a variety of sources. Wace emerges as a writer of immense importance for the period, on whom much work remains to be done; and this book is of real value to scholars who will pursue that work.