This title explores the roles of religion in comic books and graphic novels. Comic books have increasingly become a vehicle for serious social commentary and, specifically, for innovative religious thought. Practitioners of both traditional religions and new religious movements have begun to employ comics as a missionary tool, while humanists and religious progressives use comics' unique fusion of text and image to criticize traditional theologies and to offer alternatives. Addressing the increasing fervor with which the public has come to view comics as an art form and Americans' fraught but passionate relationship with religion, "Graven Images" explores with real insight the roles of religion in comic books and graphic novels. In essays by scholars and comics creators, "Graven Images" observes the frequency with which religious material - in devout, educational, satirical, or critical contexts - occurs in both independent and mainstream comics. Contributors identify the unique advantages of the comics medium for religious messages; analyze how comics communicate such messages; place the religious messages contained in comics books in appropriate cultural, social, and historical frameworks; and, articulate the significance of the innovative theologies being developed in comics.

Emphasizing Frances Burney's professionalism and her courage, the author of this work aims to show the protean writer who recognized her abilities and exercised them, always carefully shaping her career. Though now frequently depicted as retiring, even fearful, Burney forced on her reading public themes they were scarcely ready for, flamboyantly mixing genres, writing comically about intimate violence. Not content in old age to be merely a literary icon, she privately recorded with increasing clarity the moments when the world lacerates the self.

Louise Erdrich has shaped the possibilities for Native American, women's and popular fiction in the United States during the late twentieth century. Louise Erdrich collects new essays by noted scholars of Native American Literature on three important novels that chart the trajectory of Erdrich's novelistic career, Tracks (1988), The Last Report on the Miracles At Little No Horse (2001) and The Plague of Doves (2007). The book illuminates Erdrich's multiperspectival representation of Native American culture and history. Focusing on such topics as humor, religion, ethnicity, gender, race, sexuality, trauma, history, and narrative form, the essays collected here offer fresh readings of Erdrich's explorations of Native American identities through her innovative fictions.

Books 38-40 of Livy's History of Rome cover the years 189-179 BC. They contain two famous and much-discussed episodes: the trials of the Scipios, and the so-called Bacchanalian conspiracy. Other notable matters described are the end of the war with the Aetolian League and Manlius Vulso's campaign in Asia Minor, the censorship of the elder Cato, and the fatal quarrel in the Macedonian royal house. This commentary, conceived on the same scale as Briscoe's earlier commentaries on Books 31-33 and 34-37, aims to elucidate historical, literary, textual, and linguistic aspects of Livy's narrative. When Polybius, Livy's main source for events in the Hellenistic world, full references to the relevant passages of the former are given, with citation of the opening and closing words. A substantial Introduction discusses sources and methods of composition, language and style, the manuscripts, the calendar and chronology, Roman policy in northern Italy, and the Roman legions of the period.

Gothic forms of feminine fictions is a study of the powers of the Gothic in late twentieth-century fiction and film. Susanne Becker argues that the Gothic, two hundred years after it emerged, exhibits renewed vitality in our media age with its obsession for stimulation and excitement. Today's globalised entertainment culture, relying on soaps, reality TV shows, celebrity and excess, is reflected in the emotional trajectory of the Gothic's violence, eroticism and sentimental excess. Gothic forms of feminine fictions discusses a wide range of anglophone Gothic romances, from the classics through pulp fictions to a postmodern Gothica. This timely and original study is a major contribution to gender and genre theory as well as cultural criticism of the contemporary. It will appeal to scholars in a wide range of fields and become essential for students of the Gothic, contemporary fiction - particularly Alice Munro and Margaret Atwood - and popular culture. -- .

Although John Steinbeck's novellas Of Mice and Men, The Red Pony, and The Pearl are works of fiction, they provide a window on the history of the times and places they portray. Studying the historical, social, economic, and regional background of each novella is important to fully understanding each work. This interdisciplinary collection of rich collateral materials features a variety of primary documents that shed light on the background of each of these novellas--the pioneer days and life on the Western frontier, the early history of California, the gold rush, the plight of the migrant worker during the Great Depression, the problems of the homeless and the hopeless, and oppression in Mexico in the early 20th century. Documents include memoirs of mountain men and pioneers, books of travel, sociological studies, a political treatise, a journal, reports of U.S. commissions, a comic memoir, and an interview with a Salvation Army general who worked with the downtrodden during the 1930s. Most of these materials are not available in printed form anywhere else. The purpose of this volume is to explore through analysis and collateral readings the pervasive theme in these novellas: the universality of humankind's often futile struggle for a better existence. Steinbeck shows that the American vision is shaped by the dream of a better life represented in the myth of the West. A social and political commentator, he dramatizes in all three novellas the social issues of the time. The first chapter of this study, a literary analysis, examines key themes common to all three novellas. The remaining chapters place the works in historical context. "Old California and the West" includes accounts of18th- and 19th-century travelers to California who dreamed of a better life. "Land Ownership" examines the meaning of land ownership in the West and its corruption. "The Vagrant Farm Worker: Homeless in Paradise" features memoirs and journals of itinerant workers as well as Mark Twain's Roughing It and a study of the hobo. "Losers of the American Dream" deals with the homeless and hopeless during the early years of this century and the Great Depression. "The American Dream in a Mexican Setting" illuminates the lives of the oppressed in Mexico which provoked a century of revolutions. Each chapter concludes with study questions, ideas for class discussion and student projects and papers, and a list of books for further reading. This is an ideal companion for teacher use and student research in English and American history classes.

Novelist and cultural commentator C.P. Snow was a large and controversial presence in his lifetime but his work has been largely neglected since his death in 1980. This is the first 21st-century book to offer a clear, informed and sympathetic survey of all his novels and major non-fiction books and to affirm their importance for the world today.

A comprehensive introduction to the medieval languages and texts that inspired Tolkien's Middle-earth. Using key episodes in The Silmarillion , The Hobbit , and The Lord of the Rings , medieval texts are presented in their original language with translations. Essential for those who wish to delve deeper into the background to Tolkien's mythology.

This major study of a Markan genre, represented in the central section 8.27-10.4, ranges through Greek, rabbinic and early Christian literature, providing detailed comparison with the anecdotes in Lucian's Demonax and the Mishnah.Moeser concludes that the Markan anecdotes clearly follow the definition of, and typologies for, the Greek chreia. His analysis indicates that while the content of the three sets of anecdotes is peculiar to its respective cultural setting, the Greek, Jewish and Christian examples all function according to the purposes of the genre.

Lexicon Urthus is an alphabetical dictionary for the complete Urth Cycle by Gene Wolfe: The Shadow of the Torturer; The Claw of the Conciliator; The Sword of the Lictor; The Citadel of the Autarch; the sequel Urth of the New Sun; the novella Empires of Foliage and Flower; the short stories "The Cat," "The Map," and "The Old Woman Whose Rolling Pin Is the Sun"; and Gene Wolfe's own commentaries in The Castle of the Otter. The first edition was nominated for a World Fantasy Award. This second edition includes over 1,200 entries. When the first edition was published, Science Fiction Age said: "Lexicon Urthus makes a perfect gift for any fan of [Wolfe's] work, and from the way his words sell, it appears that there are many deserving readers out there waiting." Gary K. Wolfe, in Locus, said: "A convenient and well researched glossary of names and terms. . . . It provides enough of a gloss on the novels that it almost evokes Wolfe's distant future all by itself. . . . It can provide both a useful reference and a good deal of fun." Donald Keller said, in the New York Review of Science Fiction: "A fruitful product of obsession, this is a thorough . . . dictionary of the Urth Cycle. . . . Andre-Driussi's research has been exhaustive, and he has discovered many fascinating things . . . [it is] head-spinning to confront a myriad of small and large details, some merely interesting, others jawdropping."

Novelists Against Social Change studies the writing of John Buchan, Dornford Yates and Angela Thirkell to show how these conservative authors put their fears and anxieties into their best-selling fiction. Resisting the threats of change in social class, politics, the freedom of women, and professionalization produced their strongest works.

In recent years, controversy has surrounded the narrative turn in history and the historical turn in fiction. This book clarifies what is at stake, tracing connections between historiography and life-writing, arguing that the challenges posed in representing the past illuminate issues which are central to all literary narrative.

The post-war redevelopment of London has been the most extensive in its history, and has been accompanied by a dramatic social and cultural upheaval. This book explores the literary re-imagining of the city in post-war fiction and argues that the image, history, and narrative of the city has been transformed alongside the physical rebuilding and repositioning of the capital. Drawing on the ideas of Michel de Certeau, Henri Lefebvre, Anthony Vigler and others as well as the latest work on urban representation, this book is an important contribution to the study of the intersection between place, lived experience, and the literary imagination. Texts covered include novels by some of the most significant and lesser known authors of the period, including Graham Greene, George Orwell, J. G. Ballard, Stella Gibbons, David Lodge, Doris Lessing, B. S. Johnson, Sam Selvon, V. S. Naipaul, Peter Ackroyd and Iain Sinclair.

Through a detailed study of Mayy Ziyadah's literary salon, Boutheina Khaldi sheds light on salon and epistolary culture in early twentieth-century Egypt and its role in Egypt's Nahdah (Awakening). Bringing together history, women's studies, Arabic literature, post-colonial literature, and media studies, she highlights the important and previously little-discussed contribution of Arab women to the project of modernity.

Jane Austen significantly shaped the development of the English novel, and her works continue to be read widely today. Though she is best known for her novels, "Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Northanger Abbey, " and "Persuasion," she also wrote poems, letters, prayers and various pieces of juvenalia. These writings have been attracting the attention of scholars; her major works have already generated a large body of scholarly and critical studies. This reference is a guide to her works and the response to them.

Austen's works are fraught with ambiguity. Because she was adept at displaying numerous aspects of an issue, her writings invite multiple interpretations. In light of the ambiguity of her texts, each of her major works is approached from a reader-response perspective, in which an expert contributor illuminates the reader's relationship to her writing. And because so many readers have had such varied responses to her novels, the volume also includes chapters summarizing the critical response to each of her major works. In addition, the book includes separate chapters on her poems, letters, and prayers.

Marking the 50th anniversary of Lewis' death, "The Intellectual World of C. S. Lewis" sees leading Christian thinker Alister McGrath offering a fresh approach to understanding the key themes at the centre of Lewis' theological work and intellectual development.Brings together a collection of original essays exploring important themes within Lewis' work, offering new connections and insights into his theologyThrows new light on subjects including Lewis' intellectual development, the uses of images in literature and theology, the place of myth in modern thought, the role of the imagination in making sense of the world, the celebrated 'argument from desire', and Lewis' place as an Anglican thinker and a Christian theologianWritten by Alister McGrath, one of the world's leading Christian thinkers and authors; this exceptional pairing of McGrath and Lewis brings together the work of two outstanding theologians in one volume

Working from the premise that the Puritan construction of America as a return to Eden endures into American literature of the 20th century, Medoro focuses on the rhetoric of cyclical regeneration, blood, and damnation that accompanies this construction. She argues that a semiotics of menstruation infuses this rhetoric and informs the figuration of a feminine America in the nation's literary tradition: America, as a New World Eden, is haunted not only by the Fall, but also by the Curse of Eve. Placing Thomas Pynchon, William Faulkner, and Toni Morrison within this tradition, this book demonstrates that their novels link variations on the figure of the menstruating woman both to the bloody history of the United States and to a vision of the nation's redemptive promise.

Detailed readings of 9 novels--3 by each author--track references to menstruation and illuminate its tropological prevalence. The readings then develop a theory of menstruation as a kind of antidote functioning within narratives of violently spilled blood and blood purity. Each chapter draws on a range of disciplines--from medical history and mythography to anthropology and psychoanalysis--and situates its analysis of menstruation in relation to contemporary theories of female sexuality, human evolution, and the sacred.

Bringing together new accounts of the pulp horror writings of H.P. Lovecraft and the rise of the popular early 20th-century religious movements of American Pentecostalism and Social Gospel, Pentecostal Modernism challenges traditional histories of modernism as a secular avant-garde movement based in capital cities such as London or Paris. Disrupting accounts that separate religion from progressive social movements and mass culture, Stephen Shapiro and Philip Barnard construct a new Modernism belonging to a history of regional cities, new urban areas powered by the hopes and frustrations of recently urbanized populations seeking a better life. In this way, Pentecostal Modernism shows how this process of urbanization generates new cultural practices including the invention of religious traditions and mass-cultural forms.

Serial Crime Fiction is the first book to focus explicitly on the complexities of crime fiction seriality. Covering definitions and development of the serial form, implications of the setting, and marketing of the series, it studies authors such as Doyle, Sayers, Paretsky, Ellroy, Marklund, Camilleri, Borges, across print, film and television.

Ranging from soldiers reading newspapers at the front to authors' responses to the war, this book sheds new light on the reading habits and preferences of men and women, combatants and civilians, during the First World War. This is the first study of the conflict from the perspective of readers.

This book applies models that reflect the fluid, mediated, hybrid, and nomadic global scenes within which Generation X artists and writers live, think, and work in Spain. Henseler touches on critical insights in comparative media studies, cultural studies, and social theory, and conveys the nuances of multiple voices, facts, figures, and faces.

Locating literature at the intersection of distinct areas of thinking on the nature, scope and methods of knowledge - philosophy, theology, science, and the law - this book engages with literary texts across periods and genres to address questions of probability, problems of evidence, the uses of experiment and the poetics and ethics of doubt.