Аннотация

These days it seems like heroes fight each other more often than they fight villains. The hero-vs-hero trope so common in comic books and in superhero movies these days can provide us with a means of thinking about the deeply polarized state of modern politics and public opinion about civic life, morality, and even God. There is a real divide in our public life that nobody seems to be able to cross. It's easy to complain that people should be more willing to meet each other half-way, that politicians should be more willing to compromise in order to get things done, but there are plenty of important issues on which compromise really isn't possible. We see this problem dramatized in comics like Marvel's Civil War and Avengers vs X-Men; in DC's Kingdom Come and The Dark Knight Returns; and in film media like Daredevil, Batman v Superman, and Captain America: Civil War. The consequences of the conflicts that arise in these stories can serve as warnings about our current political environment. They're safe places in which we can see the logic of our political dysfunction carried to frightening (but perhaps inevitable?) conclusions.

Аннотация

C. S. Lewis and the Art of Writing is written for readers interested in C. S. Lewis, the writing life, and in becoming better writers. Lewis stands as one of the most prolific and influential writers in modern history. His life in letters offers writers invaluable encouragement and instruction in the writing craft. In Lewis, writers don't just learn how to write, they also learn something about how to live. This volume explores Lewis's life in, as well as his practice of, writing. From his avid reading life, to his adolescent dreams to be a great poet, through his creative failures, to his brilliant successes, to his constant encouragement of other writers, C. S. Lewis and the Art of Writing celebrates one of the twentieth-century's greatest authors.

Аннотация

When the Eternal Can Be Met excavates the philosophy behind the theology of the twentieth century's most prominent Christian writers: C. S. Lewis, T. S. Eliot, and W. H. Auden. These three literary giants converted to Christianity within little more than a decade of one another, and interestingly, all three theological authors turned to the theme of time. All three authors also came to remarkably similar conclusions about time, positing that the temporal present moment allowed one to meet the eternal. Decades before Lewis, Eliot, and Auden sought to creatively construct a fictive or poetic theology of time, the prominent philosopher Henri Bergson wrote about time's power to transform an individual's emotional and spiritual state, a theory well known by Lewis, Eliot, and Auden. When the Eternal Can Be Met argues that one cannot fully understand Lewis, Eliot, and Auden's theology of time without understanding Bergson's theories. From the secular philosophy of Bergson dawned the most important works of literary theology and treatments of time of the twentieth century, and in the Bergson-influenced literary constructs of Lewis, Eliot, and Auden, a common theological articulation sounds out–time present is where humans meet God.