DOCSLIB.ORG

The First Apocalypse of James: Martyrdom and Sexual Difference

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The First Apocalypse of James: Martyrdom and Sexual Difference The First Apocalypse of James: Martyrdom and Sexual Difference The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Haxby, Mikael C. 2013. The First Apocalypse of James: Martyrdom and Sexual Difference. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:11064646 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA The First Apocalypse of James : Martyrdom and Sexual Difference A dissertation presented by Mikael Caley Grams Haxby to The Committee on the Study of Religion in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of The Study of Religion Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts April 26, 2013 ©2013—Mikael Caley Grams Haxby All rights reserved. Dissertation Advisor: Prof. Karen L. King Mikael Caley Grams Haxby The First Apocalypse of James : Martyrdom and Sexual Difference Abstract My dissertation presents a new reading of a rarely-studied early Christian text, the First Apocalypse of James , and seeks to intervene in major scholarly debates concerning martyrdom, scriptural interpretation and sexual difference. I begin by showing how the text exhorts its readers and hearers toward martyrdom by narrating the progress of James, the brother of Jesus, in overcoming his fear and preparing for martyrdom. Here Jesus’ revelation to James sets out a ritual of ascent that constitutes the martyr’s confession of faith—a previously unattested form to articulate the meaning of dying for God. I use intertextual methods to identify an interpretation of the Gospel of John in which Jesus’ statements of identity in John are read as descriptions of the true nature of the perfected martyr. This analysis locates scripturally-based debates about the nature of Christ within a context in which practices of preparation for martyrdom are being devised. 1ApocJas also reads Isaiah to identify female heroes whose example it exhorts James to follow. I use this reading of 1ApocJas to challenge the notion that a strict gendered hierarchy was reinscribed equally by Christian martyrdom texts. Through comparison to select examples of Valentinian theology, I establish that 1ApocJas envisions a productive tension in the divine realms between lower and higher female divine figures. By associating female martyrs with the higher female divinities and contrasting them to the lower female divinities, 1ApocJas valorizes martyrs as female and thus complicates any straightforward masculinization of the martyrs. My reading of 1ApocJas broadens our understanding of how Christians prepared themselves for martyrdom by interpreting scripture in innovative ways, devising new ritual practices, and developing distinctive articulations of human and divine sexual difference. iii Table of Contents 1) Introduction 1 The Discourse of Orthodoxy and Heresy 7 Martyrdom 10 Sexual Difference 16 Manuscript and Dating 21 Structure of the Dissertation 26 2) Preparation for Martyrdom 30 James’ Preparation for Martyrdom 35 Fear and Knowledge in Ancient Philosophy 39 Practices of Understanding and Effective Theology 43 Martyrdom, Christology, and “Docetism” 53 Practices of Discernment and the Discourse of Martyrdom 57 3) Interpretation of Scripture 67 The Intertextual Gap: Ethics and Christology 71 Response to an Anticipated Source-Critical Objection 78 Readings of Scripture in the Passage on the “Seven Women” 81 The Dialogue with Trypho and the Christological Reading of Scripture 85 Ptolemy’s Letter to Flora and the Ethical Reading of Scripture 89 The Three Women as Moral Exemplars and the Ethical Reading of Isaiah 92 The Ethical and Christological Reading of Leviticus 95 4) Sexual Difference and Valentinian Theology 100 Sexual Difference in Theology 107 The Excerpts from Theodotus and Valentinian Theology 112 5) The Seven Women Whom All the Generations Bless 124 The Works of Femaleness 133 The Three Women Martyrs and the Power of Imitation 142 6) Conclusion: Martyrdom and Sexual Difference 149 Appendix: An Outline of the First Apocalypse of James 153 Bibliography 154 iv Acknowledgements A dissertation is never the product of a single person’s labor, and I have been lucky to share in this process with wonderful teachers, colleagues, family and friends. I am deeply grateful to my advisor, Professor Karen King, whose critiques, suggestions and encouragement made this dissertation possible. Beginning with our second-year independent study and the first time she suggested this “Apocalypse of James” text might be something I would be interested in, Professor King has been an invaluable mentor through the writing process as well as a constantly engaging and challenging dialogue partner. Professors Amy Hollywood and Laura Nasrallah were both generous with their support and feedback as members of my committee. I count myself fortunate to have been helped through the dissertation process by three such fabulous teachers and mentors, and I hope that their excellent work is reflected in this dissertation. I want to recognize also the help and inspiration of a number of other Harvard faculty members to whom I am grateful, including Giovanni Bazzana, François Bovon, Emma Dench and especially Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza. My colleagues at Harvard Divinity School and in the Committee on the Study of Religion have read, critiqued and helped to shape much of this dissertation. I thank the members of the New Testament and Christian Origins doctoral seminar for reading carefully and questioning brilliantly a number of drafts of different chapters. The members of the Columbia New Testament Seminar and the Nordic Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism Network I likewise count among the excellent readers and dialogue partners I have been able to engage with during this process. I also thank the less official Dissertation Freakout Club for their advice, their arguments and their support. Taylor Petrey and Katherine Shaner in particular have been ideal friends and colleagues, willing to chase down hour-long debates about Foucault, to challenge one other in v respectful dialogue, and always, always to gossip. I have also been lucky have among my dedicated and able readers my mother and father, Beth and Bob Grams Haxby, as well as my uncle Paul Grams. I cannot put into words my thankfulness to Elizabeth Jalkut, and so I won’t. For Beth and Bob. vi Chapter 1: Introduction “Since you asked about femaleness, listen,” says Jesus at the beginning of the First Apocalypse of James (epeidh [a]kv[i]n/e/ etbe tmNtsHime swt[µ]; 10.19–20).1 Yet, in the text up to this point, there has been no question asked about femaleness. The subsequent narrative of 1ApocJas is structured primarily as a dialogue between Jesus and his brother, James, in which James asks questions and Jesus provides revelation. It begins, however, with an answer to an unknown question. I suggest that 1ApocJas begins with a puzzle—what was this question?—in order to highlight the importance of the concept of “femaleness.” In this dissertation, I will seek to address the unraised question about femaleness from the first page of the text. As 1ApocJas moves forward, Jesus explains the nature of femaleness through theological revelation and through discussions of female disciples and martyrs. These martyrs, I will argue, along with “femaleness” provide the keys to understanding 1ApocJas . The text concludes with James’ martyrdom. The beginning and the end of the text thus bring forth the central concerns of 1ApocJas , sexual difference and martyrdom. The narrative arc of the text can also be understood in terms of martyrdom. James asks questions of Jesus and receives revelation. As he receives revelation, he grows progressively more prepared for martyrdom, confident in his knowledge and no longer wracked by fear. These revelations principally concern the nature of “femaleness” as a figure in the divine realms, and through them Jesus provides James the knowledge he needs to endure persecution. Further, James takes as 1 There are two extant versions of the First Apocalypse of James , both written in Coptic, one in the Tchacos Codex and the other in Nag Hammadi Codex V. I have quoted here from the Tchacos Codex, which is the better preserved of the two. My practice through this dissertation will be to cite first from the Tchacos Codex version, unless in rare instances the Nag Hammadi version contains a more complete record. For the lines quoted here, the parallel in Nag Hammadi Codex V is practically identical, lacking only the command to listen. “Since you asked about femaleness” (epidh akvi[n]e Nsöa TmNtsHime ; V 24.26–27). I will discuss the manuscript evidence for 1ApocJas below on pages 21–26. William R. Schoedel, “The (First) Apocalypse of James,” in Nag Hammadi Codices V,2–5 and VI with Papyrus Berolinensis 8502, 1 and 4 (ed. Douglas M. Perrott; NHS XI; Leiden: Brill, 1979), 65–104; Rodolphe Kasser and Gregor Wurst, eds, The Gospel of Judas: Critical Edition (Washington, D.C.: National Geographic, 2007). 1 moral exemplars in his preparation a set of female martyrs. The two leading, interrelated concerns of the First Apocalypse of James , then, are martyrdom and sexual difference. This is a common concatenation of themes in early Christian literature. Christians and other persecuted groups developed notions of martyrdom in response to the risk of persecution and execution under Roman law. 2 Such notions of martyrdom were significantly determined by the usual space in which executions took place, the Roman arena. The arena was a key location for the working out of gendered power relations in the ancient Mediterranean world. 3 Within literature on martyrdom, the logic of the arena pressed upon the persecuted communities a need to embody certain virtues coded as male within ancient understandings of sexual difference.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Scheherazade
    SCHEHERAZADE The MPC Literary Magazine Issue 9 Scheherazade Issue 9 Managing Editors Windsor Buzza Gunnar Cumming Readers Jeff Barnard, Michael Beck, Emilie Bufford, Claire Chandler, Angel Chenevert, Skylen Fail, Shay Golub, Robin Jepsen, Davis Mendez Faculty Advisor Henry Marchand Special Thanks Michele Brock Diane Boynton Keith Eubanks Michelle Morneau Lisa Ziska-Marchand i Submissions Scheherazade considers submissions of poetry, short fiction, creative nonfiction, novel excerpts, creative nonfiction book excerpts, graphic art, and photography from students of Monterey Peninsula College. To submit your own original creative work, please follow the instructions for uploading at: http://www.mpc.edu/scheherazade-submission There are no limitations on style or subject matter; bilingual submissions are welcome if the writer can provide equally accomplished work in both languages. Please do not include your name or page numbers in the work. The magazine is published in the spring semester annually; submissions are accepted year-round. Scheherazade is available in print form at the MPC library, area public libraries, Bookbuyers on Lighthouse Avenue in Monterey, The Friends of the Marina Library Community Bookstore on Reservation Road in Marina, and elsewhere. The magazine is also published online at mpc.edu/scheherazade ii Contents Issue 9 Spring 2019 Cover Art: Grandfather’s Walnut Tree, by Windsor Buzza Short Fiction Thank You Cards, by Cheryl Ku ................................................................... 1 The Bureau of Ungentlemanly Warfare, by Windsor Buzza ......... 18 Springtime in Ireland, by Rawan Elyas .................................................. 35 The Divine Wind of Midnight, by Clark Coleman .............................. 40 Westley, by Alivia Peters ............................................................................. 65 The Headmaster, by Windsor Buzza ...................................................... 74 Memoir Roller Derby Dreams, by Audrey Word ................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Beyond the Bodice Ripper: Innovation and Change in The
    © 2014 Andrea Cipriano Barra ALL RIGHTS RESERVED BEYOND THE BODICE RIPPER: INNOVATION AND CHANGE IN THE ROMANCE NOVEL INDUSTRY by ANDREA CIPRIANO BARRA A dissertation submitted to the Graduate School—New Brunswick Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey In partial fulfillment of the requirements For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Program in Sociology Written under the direction of Karen A. Cerulo And approved by _______________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________ New Brunswick, New Jersey OCTOBER 2014 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Beyond the Bodice Ripper: Innovation and Change in the Romance Novel Industry By ANDREA CIPRIANO BARRA Dissertation Director: Karen A. Cerulo Romance novels have changed significantly since they first entered the public consciousness. Instead of seeking to understand the changes that have occurred in the industry, in readership, in authorship, and in the romance novel product itself, both academic and popular perception has remained firmly in the early 1980s when many of the surface criticisms were still valid."Using Wendy Griswold’s (2004) idea of a cultural diamond, I analyze the multiple and sometimes overlapping relationships within broader trends in the romance industry based on content analysis and interviews with romance readers and authors. Three major issues emerge from this study. First, content of romance novels sampled from the past fourteen years is more reflective of contemporary ideas of love, sex, and relationships. Second, romance has been a leader and innovator in the trend of electronic publishing, with major independent presses adding to the proliferation of subgenres and pushing the boundaries of what is considered romance. Finally, readers have a complicated relationship with the act of reading romance and what the books mean in their lives.
    [Show full text]
  • Wallace Stegner and the De-Mythologizing of the American West" (2004)
    Digital Commons @ George Fox University Faculty Publications - Department of Professional Department of Professional Studies Studies 2004 Angling for Repose: Wallace Stegner and the De- Mythologizing of the American West Jennie A. Harrop George Fox University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/dps_fac Recommended Citation Harrop, Jennie A., "Angling for Repose: Wallace Stegner and the De-Mythologizing of the American West" (2004). Faculty Publications - Department of Professional Studies. Paper 5. http://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/dps_fac/5 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Professional Studies at Digital Commons @ George Fox University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications - Department of Professional Studies by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ George Fox University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ANGLING FOR REPOSE: WALLACE STEGNER AND THE DE-MYTHOLOGIZING OF THE AMERICAN WEST A Dissertation Presented to The Faculty of Arts and Humanities University of Denver In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy by Jennie A. Camp June 2004 Advisor: Dr. Margaret Earley Whitt Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ©Copyright by Jennie A. Camp 2004 All Rights Reserved Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. GRADUATE STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF DENVER Upon the recommendation of the chairperson of the Department of English this dissertation is hereby accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Profess^inJ charge of dissertation Vice Provost for Graduate Studies / if H Date Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner.
    [Show full text]
  • Racial Violence and the Mystical Imaginary in Contemporary
    THINKING THE BODY TRANSCENDENT: RACIAL VIOLENCE AND THE MYSTICAL IMAGINARY IN CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN LITERATURE by ERICK SAMUEL SIERRA A dissertation submitted to the Graduate School-New Brunswick Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey In partial fulfillment of the requirements For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Program in Literatures in English Written under the direction of John A. McClure And approved by ______________________________ ______________________________ ______________________________ ______________________________ New Brunswick, New Jersey May, 2010 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION THINKING THE BODY TRANSCENDENT: RACIAL VIOLENCE AND THE MYSTICAL IMAGINARY IN CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN LITERATURE by ERICK SAMUEL SIERRA Dissertation Director: John A. McClure Twentieth-century literature and theory have offered no shortage of challenges to the unity of personal identity. What these undertakings leave largely unquestioned, however, is the prevailing understanding that personal identity is sealed within the confines of the physical body—the final uncontested frontier of Cartesian identity. Emerging from a matrix of recent American literature—by Don DeLillo, Charles Johnson, Tony Kushner, Toni Morrison, among others—is a counter-argument to the notion that the materially bounded self is separate from other such selves in space. For the “individual” to take shape as such, it must locate itself within a specific social identity, disavowing its connection with those who identify themselves differently: a process, these texts suggest, that can unleash racial and ideological violence. My dissertation explores six late twentieth-century American novels and plays (1982 to 1998) that both dramatize this violent process and propose an alternative through images of humans dislocated from their bodies and fusing metaphysically with other open selves across space.
    [Show full text]
  • An Analysis and Expansion of Queerbaiting in Video Games
    Wilfrid Laurier University Scholars Commons @ Laurier Cultural Analysis and Social Theory Major Research Papers Cultural Analysis and Social Theory 8-2018 Queering Player Agency and Paratexts: An Analysis and Expansion of Queerbaiting in Video Games Jessica Kathryn Needham Wilfrid Laurier University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.wlu.ca/cast_mrp Part of the Communication Technology and New Media Commons, Gender and Sexuality Commons, and the Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Ethnicity in Communication Commons Recommended Citation Needham, Jessica Kathryn, "Queering Player Agency and Paratexts: An Analysis and Expansion of Queerbaiting in Video Games" (2018). Cultural Analysis and Social Theory Major Research Papers. 6. https://scholars.wlu.ca/cast_mrp/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Cultural Analysis and Social Theory at Scholars Commons @ Laurier. It has been accepted for inclusion in Cultural Analysis and Social Theory Major Research Papers by an authorized administrator of Scholars Commons @ Laurier. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Queering player agency and paratexts: An analysis and expansion of queerbaiting in video games by Jessica Kathryn Needham Honours Rhetoric and Professional Writing, Arts and Business, University of Waterloo, 2016 Major Research Paper Submitted to the M.A. in Cultural Analysis and Social Theory in partial fulfillment of the requirements for Master of Arts Wilfrid Laurier University 2018 © Jessica Kathryn Needham 2018 1 Abstract Queerbaiting refers to the way that consumers are lured in with a queer storyline only to have it taken away, collapse into tragic cliché, or fail to offer affirmative representation. Recent queerbaiting research has focused almost exclusively on television, leaving gaps in the ways queer representation is negotiated in other media forms.
    [Show full text]
  • Trigger Happy: Videogames and the Entertainment Revolution
    Free your purchased eBook form adhesion DRM*! * DRM = Digtal Rights Management Trigger Happy VIDEOGAMES AND THE ENTERTAINMENT REVOLUTION by Steven Poole Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS............................................ 8 1 RESISTANCE IS FUTILE ......................................10 Our virtual history....................................................10 Pixel generation .......................................................13 Meme machines .......................................................18 The shock of the new ...............................................28 2 THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES ....................................35 Beginnings ...............................................................35 Art types...................................................................45 Happiness is a warm gun .........................................46 In my mind and in my car ........................................51 Might as well jump ..................................................56 Sometimes you kick.................................................61 Heaven in here .........................................................66 Two tribes ................................................................69 Running up that hill .................................................72 It’s a kind of magic ..................................................75 We can work it out...................................................79 Family fortunes ........................................................82 3 UNREAL CITIES ....................................................85
    [Show full text]
  • The Female Gothic Connoisseur: Reading, Subjectivity, and the Feminist Uses of Gothic Fiction
    The Female Gothic Connoisseur: Reading, Subjectivity, and the Feminist Uses of Gothic Fiction By Monica Cristina Soare A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Professor Ian Duncan, Chair Professor Julia Bader Professor Michael Iarocci Spring 2013 1 Abstract The Female Gothic Connoisseur: Reading, Subjectivity, and the Feminist Uses of Gothic Fiction by Monica Cristina Soare Doctor or Philosophy in English University of California, Berkeley Professor Ian Duncan, Chair In my dissertation I argue for a new history of female Romanticism in which the romance – and particularly the Gothic romance – comes to represent the transformative power of the aesthetic for the female reader. The literary figure in which this formulation inheres is the Female Quixote – an eighteenth-century amalgamation of Cervantes's reading idealist and the satirized figure of the learned woman – who embodies both aesthetic enthusiasm and a feminist claim on the world of knowledge. While the Female Quixote has generally been understood as a satirical figure, I show that she is actually at the forefront of a development in British aesthetics in which art comes to be newly valued as a bulwark against worldliness. Such a development arises as part of mid-eighteenth-century sensibility culture and changes the meaning of an aesthetic practice that had been to that point criticized and satirized – that of over-investment in the arts, associated, as I show, with both the figure of the connoisseur and of the Female Quixote.
    [Show full text]
  • Apocalypse Thematic Issue, October 2010
    Marginalia The Journal of the Medieval Reading Group Apocalypse Thematic Issue, October 2010 http://www.marginalia.co.uk/ Marginalia, October 2010 i Marginalia Apocalypse Thematic Issue, October 2010 Editors‘ foreword iii Articles The Apocalypse and Religious Propaganda: Illustrations by Albrecht 1 Dürer and Lucas Cranach the Elder —Denise Alexandra Hartmann Imperfect Apocalypse: Thomas of Erceldoune‘s reply to the Countess of 11 Dunbar in Harley MS 2253—Victoria Flood Holy Shit: Bosch‘s Bluebird and the junction of the scatological and the 28 Eschatological in Late Medieval Art—Marisa Mandabach Notes The Cup of Dom—the Identity of a Small Figure on the Franks Casket 50 —Dustin McKinley Frazier The Apocalyptic vision on the Cross of Sts Patrick and Columba 57 —Nienke Van Etten Reviews 64 Cover Image: An image from St John's College, Cambridge, MS B.9, f.169v, by permission of the Master and Fellows of St John's College, Cambridge. Marginalia, October 2010 ii Acknowledgements: For this issue, the editors would particularly like to thank the copyright holders of all the images: the Master and Fellows of St. John‘s College, Cambridge; Prestel; the Albertina Museum, Vienna; Erich Lessing/Art Resource; the British Library Board; the Bodleian Library; Images for Academic Publishing, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY; V&A Images, Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Jörg P. Anders; J. Paul Getty Mu- seum, Los Angeles; the Trustees of the British Museum; and Nienke van Etten. Editorial Board Issue Editor: Joanna Bellis (Pembroke College, Cambridge, Literature) General Editor: Aisling Byrne (St John's College, Cambridge, Literature) Design Editor: Danica Summerlin (Queens' College, Cambridge, History) Advisory Board Dr.
    [Show full text]
  • Highlights of American Literature. INSTITUTION United States Information Agency, Washington, DC
    DOCUMENT RESUME ED 417 420 CS 216 258 AUTHOR Bode, Carl TITLE Highlights of American Literature. INSTITUTION United States Information Agency, Washington, DC. Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. PUB DATE 1995-00-00 NOTE 291p.; "First published 1981; this edition reprinted 1995." PUB TYPE Guides - Classroom Learner (051) Guides Classroom Teacher (052) EDRS PRICE MF01/PC12 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Authors; Discussion (Teaching Technique); English (Second Language); Literary History; Literary Styles; *Novels; *Poetry; Questioning Techniques; *Reading Materials; Secondary Education; *United States Literature IDENTIFIERS Historical Background ABSTRACT Intended for high-intermediate/advanced level students of English as a foreign language, this book contains selections from the wide range of American literature, from its beginnings to the modern period. Each section begins with a general introduction to the literary period, and then presents essays about individual authors, selections from the author's writings, discussion questions at the end of each prose selection or group of poems, and discussion questions at the end of each chapter. The "National Beginnings" section discusses Benjamin Franklin, Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper, Philip Freneau, William Cullen Bryant, Edgar Allan Poe, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. The "Romanticism and Reason" section discusses Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Herman Melville, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Mark Twain, Stephen Crane, and Henry James, "The
    [Show full text]
  • BOWLING GREEN STATE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 556843 Ii ABSTRACT Vo
    JERZY KOS INSKI I A STUDY OP HIS NOVELS David J. Lipani A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate School of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY August 1973 BOWLING GREEN STATE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 556843 ii ABSTRACT Vo. The Introduction examined relevant aspects of Kosin­ ski’s life in an attempt to establish a relationship between his past experiences and the major themes of his fiction. It was discovered that the author’s exposure to diverse forms of authoritarian control constituted the source of his bias against any external force operating counter to the self’s freedom. The four novels comprising the Kosinski canon were analyzed in detail, especially as they were directed toward the quest for a viable self in a contemporary world threatening to submerge the individual consciousness. Each protagonist was shown struggling with some variant of social repression» the boy in The Painted Bird faced hostile peasants who, swayed by Nazist ideology, viewed him as a menace to their own safety» the narrator in Steps fled the socialist bloc because there he had no control of his destiny, nor was his being acknowledged as an entity separ­ ate from the masses» Chance, in Being There, was subjected to a more insidious totalitarianism--the television medium, whose false representation of reality effectively kneads the individual into an easily manipulated, mindless soul» and Jonathan Whalen, in The Devil Tree, fell victim to the Protestant Ethic, the demands of which left him unable to see himself as something other than an image occasioned by wealth and status.
    [Show full text]
  • Grimdark Magazine Issue 24 PDF
    1 Contents From the Editor Adrian Collins A Slow Kill Peter Orullian An Interview with Richard K. Morgan Beth Tabler Review: Persephone Station Author: Stina Leicht Review by malrubius Berzerker Matthew X. Gomez Robert E. Howard: Godfather of Grimdark? Matthew John How Not to Invade a Country Anna Stephens An Interview with David Wong Beth Tabler The Hunt Matthew Ward 2 From the Editor ADRIAN COLLINS Sweet literary gods this year just keeps escalating, doesn’t it? Australia burned at the start of the year, now the US burns at the three-quarter buzzer, and over all of that madness the plague runs rampant, a huge chunk of our species still starves and thirsts anyway, and global superpowers have decided that this year is the year to really see how close to the line they can push each other. I’m pretty sure Death has had all of his lunch breaks and evening plans cancelled for 2020. However, amongst it all, we’re still fortunate enough to be alive and publishing, a fact for which I am incredibly grateful for. Whoever you are, and wherever you are, I hope you and yours are safe and healthy, you have a cupboard full of food, and you’ve retained employment or have a government that’s looking after you. There are still plenty of amazing books and stories coming out this year for us to escape in to—it’s so good to see the creative world keep rolling on, despite the apocalypse seeming like it’s on our doorstep. And I hope, that in these pages, our dedicated team have brought some of that amazing fiction, and those brilliant voices right to your imagination.
    [Show full text]
  • BREAKING the MONOLITH ESSAYS, ARTICLES and COLUMNS on ISLAM, INDIA, TERROR and OTHER THINGS THAT ANNOY ME Ii Breaking the Monolith Contents Iii
    Contents i BREAKING THE MONOLITH ESSAYS, ARTICLES AND COLUMNS ON ISLAM, INDIA, TERROR AND OTHER THINGS THAT ANNOY ME ii Breaking the Monolith Contents iii BREAKING THE MONOLITH ESSAYS, ARTICLES AND COLUMNS ON ISLAM, INDIA, TERROR AND OTHER THINGS THAT ANNOY ME Ziauddin Sardar iv Breaking the Monolith First Published 2008 by ImprintOne C-562, Sushant Lok-1 Gurgaon-122002, Haryana © Copyright 2008 Ziauddin Sardar All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. ISBN: ??? Typeset by Print Services, B-17, Lajpat Nagar Part 2, New Delhi 110024 Printed at ??? Exclusively Distributed by Foundation Books Division Cambridge University Press India Pvt. Ltd. Delhi • Bangalore • Mumbai • Kolkata • Chennai • Hyderabad www.foundationbooksindia.com Contents v Contents Introduction: The Things That Annoy Me 1 Part One: The Sphere of Islam 15 The Agony of 21st Century Muslim 17 Can Islam Change? 25 The Struggle for Islam’s Soul 33 Reformist Ideas and Muslim Intellectuals 41 Islam and Science: Beyond the Troubled Relationship 57 Islam and Secularism 84 Three Cheers for Women Imams 91 My Fatwa on the Fanatics 95 Is Muslim Civilisation Set on a Course to Decline? 98 Waiting for Rain 107 The Puritan Formula 114 On the Culture of Martyrdom 118 Cultivating the Soil 122 Why Are Muslim So Boring?
    [Show full text]