In this rich and learned volume, Daniel Anlezark explores the use of the biblical story of the flood in Latin and Old English literature in England from the eighth century to the eleventh. This is primarily a work of literary scholarship rather than a cultural history, and one of its many pleasures is the sensitivity and perceptiveness of Anlezark's readings. However, Anlezark's inquiry goes beyond the traditional remit of such studies, which were content to chart and record the textual borrowings and influence of the Bible and exegesis in Old English text, to examine not only where this myth was used but also how it was used (i.e., what work this story did in Anglo-Saxon England).

Water and Fire proceeds thematically rather than chronologically, grouping texts together by their different treatments of the biblical story. Anlezark firmly places the biblical story of the flood in the context of myths of creation and catastrophe found in other cultures and emphasizes the resonances aspects of the tale would have for non-Christian Germanic traditions, for example, concerning the end of the world or concerning the progeny of the sons of God and the daughters of men, who came to be equated with giants. It is difficult to do justice to the wealth of analysis here; Anlezark digs deep into the complex issues contained in the biblical story, which encompassed meaning concerning God's punishment of wrongdoing and his promise, embodied in the rainbow, never to afflict the human race again in this way. Noah's three sons were seen as the founders of the whole human race, with each son giving rise to a different continent.

Anlezark's first two chapters look at exegetical treatments of the story of Noah and his ark, in the church fathers and in Bede (who treats the ark as a type of the church and uses his commentary as a teaching tool for the young church in England). Anlezark's treatments of its apocalyptic implications and their importance in the early ninth century were particularly stimulating, and his account of the annals for 829 in the Annals of St. Bertin is a masterly lesson for historians, demonstrating with what care and artifice medieval chronicles were constructed. The volume as a whole underlines the potency of the idea of the covenant in Anglo-Saxon thought. In the ninth century, the West Saxon kings traced their descent from a fourth son of Noah, Sceaf, who was said to have been born in the ark. Anlezark shows how this idea could have arisen within early medieval theology and how the biblical past could be grafted onto the demythologized Germanic past. Alfred the Great's treatment of the flood was part of his discussion about right and wrong rule. The volume closes with a lengthy treatment of Beowulf in which Anlezark argues that the flood acts as the “mythical underpinnings” (18) of the story.

This book weaves its way into numerous intensely complex and controversial issues such as the nature of Germanic belief and thought and the dating of Beowulf, its religious content, and its relation to other texts. Anlezark demonstrates throughout a judicious and deeply wise sense of the possibilities. Nowhere does he push an argument too hard—the reconstruction of pre-Christian and non-Christian ideas is particularly hazardous since almost nothing survives without mediation through Christian authors. Anlezark's touch is very deft—suggestive and well considered. His chapter on Beowulf is suggestive and illuminating, without being either overspeculative or overcautious. He shows how learned Christian ideas form part of the poem's creative background and connect deeply with the poem's depiction of a pre-Christian world. This is a fine and highly rewarding book for students of Anglo-Saxon literature, history, and culture and those interested in religious myth and Christian thought.