[citation needed] Within this structure, the anthology incorporates a number of thematically linked "clusters" of texts pertaining to significant contemporary concerns.

The first of these includes four contemporary English translations of an identical passage from the Bible, those of William Tyndale, the Geneva Bible, the Douay–Rheims Version, and the Authorized (King James) Version; selections from the writings of influential Protestant thinkers of the period, including Tyndale, John Calvin, Anne Askew, John Foxe and Richard Hooker; as well as selections from the Book of Common Prayer and the Book of Homilies.

[4] Published in 1962, the first edition of Norton Anthology was based on an English literature survey course Abrams and fellow editor David Daiches taught at Cornell University.

[7] The 1970s saw the emergence of The Oxford Anthology of English Literature; its editorial team included leading scholars Harold Bloom, Frank Kermode, and Lionel Trilling.

Of this relationship, Joyce Jensen of The New York Times wrote in 1999, "The first stone in the war between Longman and W. W. Norton, the David and Goliath of the anthology publishing world, has been cast.

Then again, perhaps the Norton hasn't simply been imitating us in its rapid inclusions of Marie de France, Hogarth, The Beggar's Opera, Frankenstein, and a range of new context groupings whose topics track ours with what may only appear to be beagle-like devotion.

[11] The editorial team for The Broadview Anthology of British Literature includes leading scholars such as Kate Flint, Jerome J. McGann, and Anne Lake Prescott and has in general been very well received, though its sales have yet to match those of the competitors from the two larger publishers.

[citation needed] In 2006, Rachel Donadio of The New York Times stated: "Although assailed by some for being too canonical and by others for faddishly expanding the reading list, the anthology has prevailed over the years, due in large part to the talents of Abrams, who refined the art of stuffing 13 centuries of literature into 6,000-odd pages of wispy cigarette paper.

"[1] Sarah A. Kelen summarizes the changes to the NAEL's inclusions of medieval literature through successive editions, demonstrating the way the Anthology's contents reflect contemporary scholarship.