In both popular tradition and academic circles, the name most associated with the English Bible is William Tyndale. This notion is reinforced by David Daniell's superb book The Bible in English: Its History and Influence (New Haven, CT, 2003). Receiving less acclaim are the accomplishments of Bede, Aelfric the “Grammarian,” and Richard Rolle, and although the name of John Wyclif is by no means obscure, his translation (or, should one say, the translation for which he has been given credit) simply has not been given proper attention.

Mary Dove's The First English Bible: The Text and Context of the Wycliffite Versions is the first major study of the Wycliffite Bible since the prolific religious historian Margaret Deansley first published her The Lollard Bible and Other Medieval Biblical Versions in 1920. Dove serves as reader in English at the University of Sussex and is well qualified to write this book, considering her earlier work on medieval biblical translations. Her book is best described not as a history of the Wycliffite Bible but rather as an intensive textual analysis of it. Her goal, in short, is to analyze the text and the context of the two versions—“Earlier” and “Later,” to borrow from Josiah Forshall and Sir Frederic Madden—of this cultural achievement.

In the early chapters, Dove examines the context. In chapter 1, she discusses the debate over the necessity of translating the Latin Bible into English, noting that the fear was not so much about having a Bible in the English language but about having a Bible that the laity could read. What was distinctive about the Lollards was that they rejected the assumption that only the clergy, and not the laity, could understand scripture. An English Bible, the authorities believed, could create political dissension, for it could encourage the people to question church authority, as well as the relationship between church and state. Indeed, in 1409 the government prohibited the translated Bible of Wyclif and his associates, despite the earlier rhetorical efforts of secular cleric and academic Richard Ullerston to defend the value of a vernacular text.

Did this legislation work? English Bibles continued to be produced, yet their owners were discreet since they did not want to be accused of heresy. Some copies of the Bible were given away, and not all by Lollards. Moreover, Wyclif 's Bible might have been read aloud during services, or privately by some pious individuals, since some copies contain lectionaries. Dove's chapter on the translating work affirms that it is a misnomer to think that this work was done by Wyclif alone: the Bible was a “group endeavor” (79). The names of those individuals composing this team, for the most part, are not definitively known. In Dove's view, only Nicholas Hereford—and not John Purvey—should be seen as a confirmed translator.

The book's greatest strength is its careful, richly detailed examination of the Wycliffite Bible itself. Engrossed in the text, Dove points out that the order of the contents, in general, was like that found in Latin Bibles that had been produced in France for nearly two hundred years. Books that Protestants later would reject, such as Tobit, Judith, and the Macabees, appear. The great Jerome provided prologues for individual books, and Wyclif 's work follows this model, but manuscripts of the “Earlier” version were lacking some or all of the prologues, even for critical New Testament books. As for the translation itself, this was not a literal word-for-word anglicizing of Jerome's Latin; rather, in Dove's estimation, the translators likely intended to “make Latin English,” a pattern evident from the first words of Genesis (137). Wyclif and his associates sought an open text and were not against using glosses when difficult passages demanded elucidation. Some glosses even contained political commentary. During the Reformation, critics such as Thomas More would claim that Wyclif—the heretic—intentionally corrupted the text to promote error, yet Dove shows that while the translation, especially the “Earlier” version, certainly did contain errors, in general the text was more accurate than the typical Latin Bibles already extant. Dove provides ample evidence for her assertions; nevertheless, the necessary minutiae in these pages would make this difficult reading for the undergraduate. One quibble: although the author does discuss the effects of the Wycliffite Bible, the chapter is rather short; some key points could have been elaborated upon further.

The four appendixes offer a great deal of original material, taking up over sixty pages. In these Dove lists the contents of both the “Earlier” and “Later” versions and corrects errors made in the 1850 edition of the Bible. The most useful might be appendix 4, “Descriptions of Select Wycliffite Bible Manuscripts.” Created decades before Johannes Gutenberg's movable type printing press came into existence, only twenty complete Wycliffite Bibles survive intact. Dove provides details dieval religious history in part because of the author's obviously deep respect for and appreciation of Wyclif 's achievement. A book of this magnitude will likely demand a second edition at a later time since this represents the definitive study on Wyclif 's Bible.