David N. Klausner's invaluable work Wales provides the most complete listing of performance in Wales to date and adds a distinctly “other” flavor to what we know about performance culture in medieval and early modern Britain. The eighteenth collection of records published in the Records of Early English Drama (REED) series, Wales is the first to look beyond England. At a time when literary studies are becoming increasingly interested in the many voices of Britain, this volume comes as a delight, extending the scope of performance not only beyond London but also well beyond English-speaking communities.

Like other REED volumes, Wales provides external evidence of the drama, secular music, and other communal entertainment and ceremony occurring in Wales from the Middle Ages through the mid-seventeenth century. Coming in at merely 700-plus pages, Wales is small compared to York's over 900 pages or Somerset topping out at over 1,100 pages. Its length may have something to do with the status of surviving records as well as the differences between Welsh and English cultural entertainment. Klausner's intriguing and valuable resource points to the main differences between Wales and other areas of Britain during the period. As a result, Wales is a volume of differences. We expect differences in language. Those differences include the types of records, their content, and acquisition as well.

The records themselves cover pages 3–268 and are written in Welsh, Latin, Anglo-Norman, and English. Although Klausner complains that because of the nature of record keeping representation from each of Wales’ thirteen counties varies widely, each is nonetheless represented. Additional material placing these records in context includes an extensive introduction covering “Historical Background,” which offers Welsh geography as well as Welsh history, proving that to understand Wales, one must first understand the landscape. “Drama, Music, and Popular Customs,” “The Documents,” “Editorial Procedures,” and maps complete the introduction. Six appendices, of which “Ancillary Texts of the Statute of Gruffudd ap Cynan” and “Records Relating to Robert ap Huw” are particularly interesting, provide information on Welsh music, forgeries, and royal accounts. Translations from Latin and Welsh and endnotes to the records provide essential information and commentary. Glossaries of Latin, English, and Welsh words and an extensive index round out the volume.

Language is the most obvious difference in this REED volume compared to other volumes, as the missing “E” in its collective title—renamed Records of Early Drama rather than Early English Drama—acknowledges. Klausner's work proves the fluidity of language shared especially in the border regions of Wales and stresses the blending and adapting that was still going on well after Henry VIII's Acts of Union, even in the arts, which were exempt from Henry's language policies but affected nonetheless. Some records document the divide between Welsh and English within Wales. “The State of North Wales Touching Religion” (1572–98) illustrates the commonly held English attitude toward the Welsh. Written in English by an Englishman, the record describes the Welsh pastime on Sundays and holidays of gathering on “some mountaine where their harpers and Crowthers singe them songes of the doeings of theire Auncestors namelie theire warrs against the kinges of this realme and the English nacion” and observes that “where the gospell hath bine leaste preached, … suerlie is in Wales” (29–30).

In addition to language differences, Wales also quite vividly shows the differences in Welsh and English artistic culture, with the Welsh favoring music and poetry to drama. However, the volume proves that Wales hosted dramatic performances, in both Welsh and English, and fostered the creation of some (e.g., Y Gwr Kadarn and The Rebellion of Naples), thus refuting the belief that Wales had no drama until the eighteenth century.

Other differences include venues for entertainments, forging of documents, lack of royal progresses, criteria for selecting documents, and dating of the documents. Although other REED projects use the closing of the theaters as an end date, Wales goes through 1660, partly because, as Klausner argues, the 1642 date has little to do with Wales, and partly because a number of documents show an active performance heritage after this date.

The joy of the records comes in discovering entries peculiarly Welsh—Gruffudd Hiraethog's Bardic License (105/6, 339), the Statute of Gruffudd ap Cynan, regulations governing the verse and behavior of the bards (e.g., an apprentice poet may compose poetry only to women [159–176, 349–64]), Rhys Cain's Cwrs Clera or bardic circuit (106–10, 339–42), and from 1365, Gruffudd ap Adda ap Dafydd's poem to a Maypole (239–41, 386–88). Most interesting in the volume are records and commentary on the Welsh bardic tradition, still practiced today. This work presents significant information on how the Welsh valued and honored their poetry. Klausner educates his reader on the history of the Welsh bardic tradition about which the records themselves speak frequently. Although bardic poetry often described bardic performance, except for poems that reference dates and locations, other performance references unfortunately lie outside this collection. However, the bardic presence and influence on Welsh performance culture is felt in the records nonetheless. Record after record shows what a social problem some “rhymers” were—David ap Evan Moris and his wife Jane fined for “making and publishing scandalous Welsh rymes” (238), Owen ap Thomas of Denbigh apprehended for wandering abroad and making “songes or Rymes” (138–39), and Katherein Harrie, Spinster, fined for “deuising publishing and singinge of Scandalous libelles or Welsh rymes against Sara verch Ieuan” (86), not to mention frequent presentments against “rhymers.” Records also show what a highly refined, sophisticated quality of verse the master poets crafted and what a regulated, regimented tradition they practiced to the delight of their audiences.

The book makes for compelling reading as well as for scholarly digging. For instance, one record, a 1604 Bill of Complaint regarding “a moste profaine and scurrilous stage playe … played … within the perishe Churche of Llanelly” (99), begs, as Klausner notes, for further scholarly interpretation, which is what this book and all the REED volumes are all about.

The drawback with this and any REED volume is what we cannot uncover. Each REED volume must deal with the question of surviving records, but the added layer of Welsh and English interaction makes the problem even more difficult in a volume like this. Records of the Court of Great Sessions, the court for Wales from the 1540s to 1830, were useful for some counties, but in the north, the parchment records were “sold to tailors to line cuffs and collars” (cxliii).

From dating to the survival of documents to problems with forgeries to Welsh preferences for music and poetry to the concerns for rhymesters and rogues, Wales ultimately documents the similarities and differences between Wales and its neighbor England. While the REED volumes continue to extend and enhance the picture of the performing arts in medieval and early modern Britain, based on what records are available, Wales completes the picture for Wales and superbly provides readers with rich performance activity demonstrating what it means to be Welsh in early modern Britain.