In Scandinavian Elements of "Finnegans Wake," Dounia Bunis Christiani addresses herself to an enormous task: examining the significance of Scandinavian history, literature, and languages for the composition of James Joyce's masterwork. Whereas critical studies of Joyce tend to fall into two categories-those exploring the philosophical grounding of his works and those providing close textual readings-the significance of Christiani's work lies in her deep historical and cultural analysis.