Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
What do the women novelists Charlotte Bronte, Dorothy L. Sayers, Barbara Pym, Iris Murdoch and PD James all have in common? All of these writers shared a deep commitment to the Anglican church, and were both informed and influenced by the Christian message they found there. This edited collection of essays analyses the ways in which the Anglican church's teaching can be found in the creations of these writers, ranging from Charlotte M. Yonge's depiction of church authority, to Dorothy L. Sayers' advocacy of marital submission.
Spanning writers from across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, these essays explore a range of writing styles, from autobiographical writing through social comedy, and the uncanny and supernatural. They lend insights into the way these diverse women writers share a level of coherence when examined together, and in so doing enable the reader to chart the long process of Anglicanism becoming a minority religion.
Synopsis
What do the novelists Charlotte Bront , Charlotte M. Yonge, Rose Macaulay, Dorothy L. Sayers, Barbara Pym, Iris Murdoch and P.D. James all have in common? These women, and others, were inspired to write fiction through their relationship with the Church of England. This field-defining collection of essays explores Anglicanism through their fiction and their fiction through their Anglicanism.
These essays cover a range of literary genres, from life-writing and whodunnits through social comedy, children's books and supernatural fiction. Spanning writers from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, they testify both to the developments in Anglicanism over the past two centuries and the changing roles of women within the Church of England.