"Will serve its readers well and fills a need for a readable translation... will also be useful to graduate students and to more general audiences interested in late-medieval English literature."—Mićeál F. Vaughan, University of Washington, Seattle
""This vivid new translation of the A-version of Piers Plowman by experienced Langland editor Michael Calabrese has the potential to unseat The Canterbury Tales as the go-to text for the medieval literature classroom. An introduction informed by Calabrese's own life sets the tone for a relatable read, as do footnotes forged in his east LA classroom. Entertaining and provocative, this rendering of a usually—though not this time—untameable poem is sure to become a quick favorite for its robust characters, fast-paced narrative, and read-aloud sound. Its lasting power, however, will be in the authenticity and fullness of its translation of societal ills and human struggle into a form immediately identifiable to any modern reader. While reading any version of Piers is a worthwhile endeavor, Calabrese's ought to be every student's first. It will undoubtedly guarantee a second."—Jennifer Smith, Pepperdine University
"Michael Calabrese's introduction mediates the poem to a twenty-first-century audience. His translation is accessible and engaging, written in a somewhat casual tone that captures the character of the sleepy Will while maintaining the sense that important matters are being revealed. The retention of some Middle English vocabulary for which there is no modern equivalent is supported by insightful notes that are handily at the foot of the page so as not to interrupt reading with a shuffling back and forth to look for endnotes. Calabrese's choice of the A-text of Piers is highly intelligent. It is brief enough to teach as a whole rather than as the excerpts from texts B and C that normally have to suffice. Hence, Calabrese's work offers the possibility of teaching an integral Piers Plowman in modern English."—Patricia R. Bart, Hillsdale College
"Langland has offered us a truly Catholic consideration of the great struggle that is human existence, one that requires, first and foremost, God's grace, but also our cooperation."—Crisis Magazine
"A hugely entertaining, and inviting, romp through the earliest version of Langland's great Middle English poem. Calabrese's engaging approach will surely lure many students into the world of Piers Plowman, as is his primary, and urgent, intention. There is something very alive here that one will not find in many other places. Calabrese's book is a high point in this rich area of Piers Plowman's history."—The Medieval Review
"Calabrese's translation of Piers Plowman is an admirable addition to the world of Langland's material archive, and one that I think will help students—particularly introductory ones—begin to work thoughtfully and to care about the poem."—Digital Philology
"Piers Plowman is a veritable treasure trove of comments about fundamental ethics and morality at a difficult moment of time, the late fourteenth century the new translation by Calabrese immediately invites one to restart our reading of this monumental text."—Mediaevistik
"In crafting this 'reader-centered' text, Calabrese lays out how the poem is especially illuminating for those interested in 'social justice' and 'the historical treatment of the poor.' This is the kind of proselytizing that Piers needs in order to appeal to twentieth-century readers."—Church History
"As is often remarked among devoted scholar-teachers of Piers Plowman, too few instructors in Middle English studies, to say nothing of medievalists and humanists in general, engage with this searching allegorical dream vision that was written, extended, and revised between approximately 1370 and 1388. To broaden the poems' reader-ship toward increasing their inclusion in secondary and university-level courses, Michael Calabrese has produced a vigorous and often creatively idiomatic translation of the shortest version of the poems."—Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Teaching
