Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Reflecting The Eternal: Dante's Divine Comedy In The Novels Of C. S. Lewis (Book Review), Gary L. Tandy

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Staging Intercultural Ireland: New Plays And Practitioner Perspectives, Kathleen A. Heininge

Faculty Publications - Department of English

All scholars of world literature, especially those trained in the traditions of Western thought, must ultimately grapple with the question of privilege: In opening up a space for all voices to be heard, care must be taken to avoid coopting those voices. Academics must always be aware of our own motivations so that discussions of multi-cultural literature do not appear anthropological, mere examinations of other cultures from a worldview that seems ubiquitous but which comes from a place of unconscious-perhaps- superiority. Critics from Edward Said, in Orientalism, to Gayatri Spivak, in "Can the Subaltern Speak?" to Chinua Achebe in …

Faith And God (Chapter 3 Of "Reflections: Virginia Woolf And Her Quaker Aunt, Caroline Stephen"), Kathleen A. Heininge

Faculty Publications - Department of English

"Beyond the bulwark of family, for both Caroline Stephen and Virginia Woolf, the institution of the Church was central in fostering a patriarchal fortress that kept women in an inferior position. For Caroline, turning away from the church tradition of her forefathers led her to the Quaker tradition as a way to honor both her God and herself as a woman. For Virginia, that same impulse led her away from the church as well, and although she did not embrace the tenets of Quakerism, much of her work is certainly imbued with a Quaker sensitivity to mysticism and spirituality."

Beyond The Inward Light: The Quaker Poet In Community, Bill Jolliff

Faculty Publications - Department of English

It's a privilege to be granted a chance tq address a gathering like this: a room full of people whose Quaker way of life and thought are so very central to their work that they spend time and resources to get together and talk about it. We've been blessed with a common gift, and it isn't a small one.

That said, I suspect I'm not the only one here who sometimes wonders how, or even if, what I do matters. Yet even among you, my group of fellow self-doubters, I must lobby for my own elevated position: as a poet …

Book Review: Come Back By Rudy Wiebe, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "Come Back is a beautifully written novel, manifesting Wiebe's immense skill with the written word. Those unfamiliar with Wiebe's style might find Come Back a more difficult read; the lack of a straightforward narrative and the intertwining of various voices may cause too much dissonance for some readers. Yet, as a two time winner of Canada's Governor General's Award (in 1973 and 1994), Wiebe clearly understands his craft, and his place in English letters has already been well established. Come Back adds to his esteem as perhaps the preeminent voice in Mennonite literature. The heartbreaking struggle of Hal …

Book Review: Between 2 Gods: Memoir Of Abuse In The Mennonite Community, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "Metzger’s journey toward this epiphany is a difficult one, and she does not attempt to mollify readers by avoiding distressing details. This is a definite strength in Between 2 Gods. Rather than offer us a pleasant story of healing and redemption alone, Metzger names the many abuses she experienced at the hands of those who should love and protect her, including family members and church leaders. One point made both implicitly in Between 2 Gods, and explicitly by its publication, is exactly this: that people need to acknowledge their abuses for there to be healing; and that stories about …

Book Review: Ordinary Miracles: Awakening To The Holy Work Of Parenting, A Memoir With Pictures, And When The Roll Is Called A Pyonder: Tales From A Mennonite Childhood, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "Perhaps the most powerful first-person story shared by a Mennonite in the past year has yet to appear in traditional print. It was instead publishing on a blog with a fairly modest following on Facebook. And yet, Sharon Detweiler’s January 9 story, posted on the Our Stories Untold site, produced considerable discussion, both on the site itself and in other Mennonite-related venues. “John Howard Yoder: My Untold Story After Sixty Years of Silence” narrates Detweiler’s experiences with Yoder, her attempts to report his sexual abuse, and the ways Mennonite leadership failed to hear her story. After years of silence, …

Maria Redux: Incarnational Readings Of Sacred History (Chapter 7 Of Building A New World), Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Noah and the Ark. Jonah and the Big Fish. Mary's yes to the Angel. Jesus's yes in the Garden of Gethsemane. Pilot's no and his wife's please, don't. Lot's wife and her last, homeward look. To whom do these sto- ries belong? And how should we read them, each from our particular corner of incarnate humanity? Here is what my corner looks like: I am a woman; I am a feminist; l am a literary critic; I am a product of Westernized Christianity. I write and read from the space where these words overlap, but what does that mean when …

Chaoskampf, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "The road to Camp On High was a two-lane highway that snaked uneasily up the side of Cedar Mountain. Quinn sat in the back of the van, next to a window that looked out into empty space. Somehow, the other kids were sleeping through this, three neat rows of lolling heads, ear buds dangling. Earlier in the ride, sturdy evergreens had covered the mountainside, jutting upward and waiting to catch the van that would, any second-Quinn was convinced-careen over the edge. But by now the trees had grown fragile and sparse, exposing gashes of red-orange rock and promising nothing."

Book Review: The Wittenbergs: A Novel By Sarah Klassen, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "In many ways, Sarah Klassen's novel, The Wittenbergs, turns on the question of family history and just how heavy a burden one family's past can weigh upon its current generations. For the Wittenbergs, the family at the center of Klassen's text, this sometimes unacknowledged weight carries with it certain consequences. Only a reformation of sorts can set the family free to understand their history in new, more hopeful, ways."

Living By The Code: Authority In Gerard Stembridge's The Gay Detective, Kathleen A. Heininge

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Irish drama has few representations of police officers as anything but a trope for authority, tending to avoid any substantive character development. Likewise, it has few representations of homosexual characters, and when such representations do exist they are often caricatures. Reductive portrayals of police often arise from the complex relationship the Irish have with authority and with the legal system. But one of the few exceptions to this trend, and the only play to tackle the representation of a police officer and a homosexual at once, is Gerard Stembridge’s play The Gay Detective (1996). The play offers up the character …

Book Review: Letters And Life By Bret Lott, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "Lott’s newly published book, Letters and Life, limns and amplifies the themes expressed in “Genesis.” Letters and Life enters into a centuries-old conversation about what it means to be an artist and a Christian, relying on what has already been written about the Christian artist to expand and deepen our notions of faith and art, showing that, like the child-narrator in “Genesis,” the artist in creation imitates God."

On (Not) Fearing The Mystery Of God (Chapter 8 Of The Spirit Of Adoption: Writers On Faith, Adoption, God, And More), Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Just days before our trip to India, birthplace of my second son, a well-meaning relative cornered me at a family gathering. "We'll be praying for you!" she said, uttering the Christian phrase that can be, at the same moment, both cliche-riddled and completely sincere.

I chose to interpret it as sincere, needing all kinds of prayer for our journey. My husband and I were flying to India with our then six-year-old sons: Benjamin, whom we'd adopted from Vietnam as an infant, and Samuel, whom we brought home from Mumbai as a three-year-old. This was no ordinary homeland trip. My adult …

Book Review: Bonnet Strings: An Amish Woman's Ties To Two Worlds And Others, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "In Entering the Wild, Janzen narrates the process of crafting these hymns; and I found this chapter, titled “Three Women and the Lost Coin: How Three Women Found Me,” the memoir’s most compelling. In 1990, Janzen was asked to be on a committee to recreate a Mennonite hymnal that might “nourish . . . congregations for twenty years or more.” The committee, wanting to include several hymns honoring the feminine characteristics of God, turned to Janzen. Janzen describes encountering the work of three mystic women—Julian of Norwich, Hildegard von Bingen, and Mechtild of Magdeburg—and 􀂡nding there “the possibilities of …

Why Some Evangelicals Are Trying To Stop Obsessing Over Pre-Marital Sex, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

What About The Boys?, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

No Rape Victim, Male Or Female, Deserves To Be Blamed, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

The Pros And Cons Of Abandoning The Word 'Feminist', Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

The Child Is The Father Of The Man - Mad Men, Episode 8, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

Review Of Mcfee's "That Was Oasis", Bill Jolliff

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

Review Of York's "Cold Spring Rising", Bill Jolliff

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

Review Of Clabough's "Inhabiting Contemporary Southern And Appalachian Literature", Bill Jolliff

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

Don Draper Was Raped, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

'In Love With Either/Or': Religion And Oppositional Logic In Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale (Chapter 3 Of Irigaray, Incarnation And Contemporary Women's Fiction), Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "Margaret Atwood is a prolific and award-winning Canadian writer whose work regularly exposes the destructive and oppressive forces at work in society, particularly as they affect women. Though Atwood refers to herself as a 'strict agnostic: she maintains an interest in religion, which is evident in her fictional work (Moyers 2006).1 Atwood's second novel, Surfacing (1973) , has received a fair amount of critical attention for its religious themes and is examined in both Carol Christ's Diving Deep and Surfacing and Barbara Rigney's work Lilith's Daughters.2 Atwood's Cat's Eye (1989), with its mystical Marian imagery, has also been explored …

Bread-Winning And Bread-Baking: On Being A Provider, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

The Postfeminist Mystique - Or, What Can We Learn From Betty Draper?, Abigail Rine

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

Book Review Of Doug Frank's Gentler God, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "Like most people, my understanding of God’s image and character has been transformed over time: in my case, from the bearded old white man of Sunday school lore, giving judgment from atop fluffy clouds, to a much more inclusive—and, to be honest, more ambiguous—deity, whose being is neither male nor female, bearded nor white. One aspect of God has remained fairly constant, however. I too often believe God to be a vindictive figure, eager to smack me down. Miss church a few Sundays in a row? Something bad is bound to happen. Say one too many swear words? God …

Book Review: A Journey With Two Maps: Becoming A Woman Poet, Kathleen A. Heininge

Faculty Publications - Department of English

For those familiar with Eavan Boland's book, Object Lessons, her latest defense of the woman poet begins in well-traveled territory. A Journey with Two Maps: Becoming a Woman Poet) reiterates her struggles to find an authentic voice in a poetic and political history that has largely excluded the voices of women. She again notes her sense of dislocation-Irish but not raised in Ireland-and recognizes the effect of such dislocation on her participation in the project called Irish poetry. She repeats her observation that poetry has traditionally been confined to the recondite, defined as war, death, and God, a definition excluding …

Review Of Carver's "Cathedral", Polly Peterson

Faculty Publications - Department of English

No abstract provided.

A Christian Feminist Speaks Out On The Drone War In Pakistan, Melanie Springer Mock

Faculty Publications - Department of English

Excerpt: "On a warm morning recently, as I was backing the car out of the garage, I saw my eldest son standing on our porch, still in his pajamas and bare feet, looking mournfully at me. I stopped the car and asked what he wanted. “To give you a hug,” he said. I parked the car, got out, and picked up my growing kid, holding him for a moment as I might an infant, his long legs wrapped around me. Right then, nothing felt sweeter."