This innovative book aims to create a ‘poetics of Church’ and a ‘religious imaginary’ as alternatives to more institutional and conventional ways of thinking and of being ‘Church’. Structured as a spiritual and literary journey, the work moves from models of the institutional Catholic Church into more radical and ambiguous textual spaces, which the author creates by bringing together an unorthodox group of thinkers referred to as ‘poet-companions’: the 16th-century founder of the Society of Jesus, Ignatius of Loyola, the French thinkers Gaston Bachelard and Hélène Cixous, the French poet Yves Bonnefoy, and the English playwright Dennis Potter. Inspired especially by the reading and writing practices of Cixous, the author attempts to exemplify Cixous’ notion of écriture féminine—‘feminine writing’—that suggests new ways of seeing and relating. The project’s uniting of Ignatian spirituality with postmodern thinking and its concern with creating new theological, literary and spiritual spaces for women both coincide and contrast with Pope Francis’s pastoral and reformist tendencies, which have neglected to adequately address the marginalisation of women in the Church. As Francis has called for ‘a theology of women’, of which there are, of course, many to draw from, this volume will be a timely contribution with a unique interdisciplinary approach.

What makes one poem better than another? Do Christians have an obligation to strive for excellence in the arts? While orthodox Christians are generally quick to affirm the existence of absolute truth and absolute goodness, even many within the church fall prey to the postmodern delusion that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” This book argues that Christian doctrine in fact gives us a solid basis on which to make aesthetic judgments about poetry in particular and about the arts more generally. The faith once and for all delivered unto the saints is remarkable in its combined emphasis on embodied particularity and meaningful transcendence. This unique combination makes it the perfect starting place for art that speaks to who we are as creatures made for eternity.

A Poetics of Resistance: Narrative and the Writings of Pier Paolo Pasolini examines the writings of the Italian poet, novelist, filmmaker, theorist, and dramaturg.

Despite recent interest in forgiveness and reconciliation, relatively little research has been conducted on forgiveness in literary studies. A Poetics of Forgiveness explores the profound links between creativity and forgiveness, and argues that creative production and interpretation can play a vital role in practices of forgiveness. Developing a model of "poetic forgiveness" through the work of Julia Kristeva, Jacques Derrida, and Kelly Oliver, A Poetics of Forgiveness asks how forgiveness is expressed in literature and other art forms, and what creative works can bring to secular debates on forgiveness and conflict resolution. Jill Scott explores these questions in a wide variety of historical and cultural contexts, from Homer s Iliad to 9/11 novels, from postwar Germany to post-Apartheid South Africa, in canonical texts and in diverse media, including film, photography, and testimony.

In a calm, sustained style, the author breaks new ground in the ongoing feminist theological pilgrimage, one that will make traditionalists squirm and liberationists cheer." 'Choice' In 'The Power to Speak', Rebecca Chopp offers an exhilarating defense of feminist theology as proclamation and good news for all. Arguing for a critique and transformation of language, subjectivity, and politics, this thoughtful, engaged book opens new directions in feminist thought." Elizabeth Fox-Genovese A provocative treatment of feminist theology's deepest potential to transform the discipline through language." 'WATERwheel' Rebecca Chopp is developing an original theological position. Her interpretation of Christian faith and Christian theology as having to do primarily with 'emancipatory transformation' breaks through the individualistic pietism of modern liberalism as well as the provincialism of many of the liberation theologies." Gordon D. Kaufman

This title was first published in 2002: A Poetics of Jesus explores the act of writing within and between the boundaries of 19th century biblical criticism and fiction. Reflecting on the work of Christian poetics after Augustine to Baur, Feuerbach, Friedrich Strauss and Victorian novelists of the eighteenth and nineteenth century, this book breaks new ground in juxtaposing the evoked image of Christ arising from Victorian biblical criticism against the image of Christ within fiction, letting both these images and the words that figured them interact. This book offers a highly accessible introduction to 19th century literature and theology through comparisons made to contemporary post-modern theorists. Demonstrating how literature can inform theology without itself becoming 'theology', this book constitutes an important contribution to the literature/theology debate and a much needed contribution to contemporary Christology through its introduction to the literature and the writers central to the beginnings of the historical quest for Jesus.

Telling in current biblical postcolonial discourse that draws insights from the works of Aime Cesaire, Frantz Fanon, and postcolonial theorists is the missing contribution of Leopold Sedar Senghor, the architect of Negritude. If mentioned at all, Senghor is often read through conclusions drawn by his critics or dismissed altogether as irrelevant to postcolonialism. Restored to its rightful place, Senghorian Negritude is a postcolonial lens for reading Scripture and other faith traditions with a view to reposition, conscientize, liberate, and rehabilitate the conquered, and enable them to reclaim their faith traditions and practices that once directed a mutual relationship between God, human, and nature--a delicate symbiosis before the French colonial advent in West Africa. A keen eye for cross-cultural analysis and contextualization enriched this volume with an intriguing reading of scripture, Ancient Near Eastern and Greco-Roman texts in conversation with other faith traditions, particularly Senegalese Diola Religion. As a Poetics of Postcolonial Biblical Criticism, Negritude is an optic through which people of faith may look around themselves, critically reread their sacred texts, reassess their vocation, and practice mutuality with God and nature on the heels of chilling climate change. Enshrined in this innovative argument is a call for introspection and challenge for people of faith to assume their vocation--human participatory agency.

This translation of Likhachev’s Poetika Drevnerusskoy Literatury (The Poetics of Early Russian Literature), provides a description of the basic themes of early (tenth to seventeenth century) Russian literature. Likhachev compares literary narrative with narrative used in the representational arts. Furthermore, Likhachev stresses the genre-based character of medieval Russian literature and shows how choice of style in medieval times depended on a genre with its own specific etiquette and how innovation was discouraged. The text contrasts medieval abstraction and modern realism, as Likhachev shows how realisticness gradually breaks through in specific situations—such as those of princely crimes. Likhachev draws contrasts in three different areas: the basic stock of symbols and comparisons used in early Russian literature with those used in modern literature, artistic time in folklore and early Russian literature, and artistic space in folklore and early Russian literature. Likhachev traces the gradual development into modern artistic time through a comparison of the chronicle, the first Russian play, the seventeenth century writer Avvakum, and three modern authors, Goncharov, Dostoevsky and Saltykov-Shchedrin. Finally, the text gives a justification for studying early literatures. This book will be invaluable for students of Russian, medieval and comparative literature.

"Guided by Eliot's own allusions and references to specific authors and historical moments, Cuddy adds a feminist, cultural, and intertextual perspective to the familiar critical interpretations of Eliot's work in order to reread poems and plays through nineteenth-century ideologies and knowledge set against our own time. By considering the implications and consequences of Eliot's culturally approved assumptions, this study further reveals how Eliot was trapped between the idea of Evolution as a unifying project and the reality of his own and his culture's hierarchical (and fragmenting) beliefs about class, gender, religion, and race. Cuddy concludes by exploring how this conflict undermined Eliot's mission of unity and influenced his (and Modernism's) place in history."--BOOK JACKET.