Discusses 20 biblical themes, such as creation, the hero, and death and the afterlife, and relates them to a wide range of literary works commonly read by students.
Nancy M. Tischler is Professor Emerita of English and the Humanities at the Pennsylvania State University. Her previous books include All Things in the Bible (2006), Men and Women of the Bible (2003), and Student Companion to Tennessee Williams (2000), all available from Greenwood Press.
Tischler's learned commentary on integral biblical themes reads as
engagingly as a lecture by a teacher who both understands and
values the Bible as a source of wisdom and as a component of world
literature. Tischler respects the written word and the music of
poetry and seems at home with all corners of American and British
and, to some degree, world classics as well. Simple layout invites
the neophyte to read signal passages of scripture on such topics as
creation, gender, war, and the afterlife; and to peruse classic
works--Billy Budd, To Kill a Mockingbird, Donne's sonnets, The Old
Man and the Sea, Little Women, The Prince--for more recent thinking
on the chosen subjects. Tischler's tone and diction avoid tedious
cant and dogma by sticking to humanistic themes--godhood, justice,
liberty, power, sacrifice, violence--and pure, uncluttered glimpses
of human situations, such as the nonstop task of the shepherd,
David's emergence into leadership, the circumscribed world of
women, and the Jewish response to the threat of alien
invasion….Highly recommended. Home, church, high school, and public
libraries; general readers.
*Choice*
This work is recommended as an excellent beginning for further
research on particular themes such as slavery and freedom, truth,
earthly paradise, government and politics, and the journey of
life….Tischler's style of writing is a pleasure to read and would
surely be appreciated by students.
*American Reference Books Annual*
Tischler traces a few typical examples of the various biblical
themes in English and American literature, and occasionally in
their European counterparts. In each thematic chapter, she
identifies a handful of biblical and literary works she considers,
then explores how that theme has been worked out from biblical
times to the present. Among the themes are animals and humans,
women as heroes, war, predestination and free will, and last
days.
*Reference & Research Book News*
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