Thirteen essays, presented by Astell (theology, U. of Notre Dame) and Jackson (English, Hillsdale College) conduct re-readings of medieval literature in light of the thought of French philosopher and Talmudic commentator Emmanuel Levinas (1906-1995). Contributions address the use of allegory in Chaucer, the monstrous and the maternal in Beowulf, responsibility to the dead in the poem The Awntyrs off Arthure and in Levinas's memorial to the victims of the Holocaust, Levinasian aesthetics and Pires Plowman, the ethics of love and Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde, and alterity in Chaucer's Pardoner's Tale and Levinas's essay "Toward the Other," among other topics. Annotation ©2009 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)