The title of this new set of English translations with commentary has unfortunate echoes of Ray Bradbury's ‘The illustrated man’ – to say nothing of Groucho's Lydia – but that should not put anyone off. They deserve to be welcomed warmly as one of the more substantial of the English-language contributions to the quincentenary in 2017 of Luther's Reformation. These handsomely produced volumes, and the additional four scheduled to follow in short order, are designed to present ‘the essential Luther’ (vol. i, pp. vii–viii) through a selection of his most significant works. It has been done many times before, of course, but this series is distinguished from comparable efforts by the inclusion of extensive introductions and annotations, and other paratextual aids. The closest comparison in scope and size would be with the six volumes of the Martin Luther Studienausgabe, edited by H.-U. Delius, from the late 1970s/early 1980s, though that was an edition of the original Latin and German texts, not a translation.

There is much to like about this new translation. It is attractively printed, with acres of white space and all the annotations visible alongside the text: textual and translation issues are addressed in footnotes, expository and explanatory notes appear in the margins, so there is no need to keep a bookmark, or finger, embedded in the back of the book. Amongst the most valuable features are the introductions, the references to up-to-date scholarship, and the cross-references to Luther's other works. Each volume is completed by indices of names and subjects, cross-references and a list of biblical citations.

The quality of the work is generally very high. Wengert's own commentary on the Ninety-five theses, which opens vol. i, is a model of its kind, possibly the best treatment of the subject currently available in English. The translation of the Theses, as of most of the texts, is an updated version of that found in the ‘American Edition’ of Luther's Works (1955–); but a welcome feature of The annotated Luther is that it includes items omitted from the first fifty-five volumes of that venerable series. One example is the Sermon on indulgences and grace of 1518, Luther's first ‘bestseller’. The new translation offered here is fine on the whole but shaky in parts: for example, an apparent misreading of ‘gute werck der lieb’ makes Luther speak of ‘works of the body’ rather than ‘works of charity’ (i. 60). Eric Lund's rendering of the same text in his Documents from the history of Lutheranism (Minneapolis 2002) is more accurate but consists of extracts only, so there is still a need for a reliable, complete translation of this landmark work.

It is impossible for a selection to please everyone, and the editors must have been acutely aware of this. The series introduction alludes several times to the notion of ‘the essential Luther’; but The annotated Luther seems on the whole to have been a safer bet as a series title, avoiding as it does any controversy about a ‘canon’ of Luther's works. The first volume, subtitled The roots of reform, confronts the reader straightaway with the Ninety-five theses rather than with, for instance, his early lectures on the Psalms or Romans, or even with the Ninety-seven theses against scholastic theology. We are therefore presented not so much with the ‘roots’ as the fruits of Luther's early reforming activity. The volume ends with the famous 1520 treatise The freedom of a Christian; but that work might have fitted better in in the second volume (Word and faith). Equally, some of the works in the latter (for example, A brief instruction on what to look for and expect in the Gospels (1522) and How Christians should regard Moses (1525)) would have been just as much at home in the projected sixth volume, on the interpretation of Scripture. These are observations, not criticisms.

Generally speaking, the texts presented here are unabridged. The major exception is The bondage of the will (1525). Despite Luther's claim that it was one of his best, it is a work that has always cried out for a ruthless editor, so the abridgement in itself is not surprising; but it would have been helpful had the ellipses been annotated by a brief summary of the deleted content, if only to give the reader a truer sense of the work's sheer bulk. Delius' Studienausgabe was able to present the De servo arbitrio in its entirety, which illustrates one of the differences in concept and execution between the two projects.

Fortress Press is to be congratulated for commissioning this series and for entrusting it to the hands of a first-rate team of scholars under the expert direction of Timothy Wengert and Kirsi Stjerna. As a scholarly presentation of primary sources in English translation, which will be of particular use to advanced undergraduates, it could hardly be bettered. One looks forward eagerly to the later volumes in the series. However, the editors clearly have in mind a wider readership than scholars: ‘pastors and laypersons, and other professionals in ministry’ are specifically addressed (i, p. vii). Indeed, the series is intended to ‘offer a flexible tool for the global reader of Luther, making many of his most important writings available in the lingua franca of our times (i.e. the US variant of English) as one way of facilitating interest in the Wittenberg reformer’ (i, p. vii). One wonders whether these six hefty doorstoppers are a better way of serving the global reader than, say, an online resource which could be constantly updated in response to new scholarship and which might in due course include translations into languages other than English. The series also uses gender-inclusive language, which again suggests that the target readership is not principally an academic one. This is done fairly unobtrusively on the whole, though it is questionable how much clarity is served by translating ‘the Son of Man’ as ‘the child of humanity’, especially when this rendering of the Christological title requires a lengthy annotation of its own to justify it (ii. 21–2): by trying to make Luther speak as we do, we compress the distance between us and him both anachronistically and unhelpfully.