A festschrift, bringing together as it does the essays of a revered scholar's former students and beloved colleagues, sometimes has trouble finding its thread of unity. Yet this volume is more nicely conceived. Like a festschrift, it celebrates the life and work of a recent scholar—in this case, Gerhart Ladner; but unlike a festschrift, it does not merely give voice to the diverse interests of its myriad contributors, but instead directs each essayist's voice toward a seminal idea of its honoree. That idea is Ladner's view—expressed in his book The Idea of Reform—that reform was a central and uniquely Christian idea that in the early Christian era shaped notions of personal conversion in terms of a restoration of God's image in the individual sinner, but then went on in the early medieval period to also shape notions of corporate reform, most evidently in monasticism.

Reassessing Reform begins with the editors' introduction, and is followed by three essays—two by Ladner's former students—which directly discuss Ladner's notion of the idea of reform. The rest of essays, which comprise the bulk of the volume, apply Ladner's insights to specific Christian reform movements during the high and later middle ages. Some of these essays appeal to Ladner's idea of reform only tangentially. Others, however, do so significantly—sometimes with appreciation, sometimes with criticism, and often with both. Although this book will appeal to a limited audience, that audience will rightly be grateful for the care that went into its creation.