Synopses & Reviews
Augustine's Confessions is a text that seduces. But how often do its readers respond in kind? Here three scholars who share a longstanding fascination with sexuality and Christian discourse attempt to do just that. Where prior interpreters have been inclined either to defend or to criticize Augustine's views, Virginia Burrus, Mark Jordan, and Karmen MacKendrick set out both to seduce and to be seduced by his text.Often ambivalent but always passionately engaged, their readings of the Confessions center on four sets of intertwined themes-secrecy and confession, asceticism and eroticism, constraint and freedom, and time and eternity. Rather than expose Augustine's sexual history, they explore how the Confessions conjoins the erotic with the hidden, the imaginary, and the fictional. Rather than bemoan the repressiveness of his text, they uncover the complex relationship between seductive flesh and persuasive words that pervades all of its books. Rather than struggle to escape the control of the author, they embrace the painful pleasure of willed submission that lies at the erotic heart not only of the Confessions but also of Augustine's broader understanding of sin and salvation. Rather than mourn the fateful otherworldliness of his theologicalvision, they plumb the bottomless depths of beauty that Augustine discovers within creation, thereby extending desire precisely by refusing satisfaction.In unfolding their readings, the authors draw upon other works in Augustine's corpus while building on prior Augustinian scholarship in their own overlapping fields of history, theology, and philosophy.They also press well beyond the conventional boundaries of scholarly disciplines, conversing with such wide-ranging theorists of eroticism as Barthes, Baudrillard, Klossowski, Foucault, and Harpham. In the end, they offer not only a fresh interpretation of Augustine's famous work but also a multivocal literary-philosophical meditation on the seductive elusiveness of desire, bodies, language, and God.
Review
"Has there yet been an interpretation of the Confessions so profoundly committed to delight? Augustine's delight in God, in the world, in language; the reader's delight in Augustine and his text; and perhaps--the daring inversion--God's own delight in our multifarious responses. Each of the three authors engages the Confessions from a different discipline, but each is moved by the humanity and fleshliness of Augustine and his work--and their emotion is made possible by their deep attention to the divine. Our own reading of the Confessions is expanded and enriched by this seductive volume."--Catherine Conybeare, Bryn Mawr College
Review
A study of the Confessions that explores themes of secrecy and confession, eroticism, constraint and freedom, and time and eternity.
This book will work its charms on those on intimate terms with Augustine and those who (accidentally or deliberately) have kept their distance. The writing is beautiful, sharp, astute. The authorial trinity brings together some of the most accomplished voices in their respective disciplines in powerful counterpoint. -Yvonne Sherwood
Both seduced by Augustine's text and seducing it in return, as they themselves confess, the authors offer a provocative and enticingly fresh guide through Augustine's Confessions. Compelling and compellingly varied, their readings highlight the excess, paradox, and performative quality that mark the complex eroticism of Augustine's great work. This volume is a deeply insightful set of studies, well-theorized and thoroughly interdisciplinary.-Patricia Cox Miller
"Seducing Augustine is an intriguing, multidisciplinary reflection focused on a single passage in Augustine's Confessions . . . Recommended."-Choice
This book will work its charms on those on intimate terms with Augustine and those who (accidentally or deliberately) have kept their distance. The writing is beautiful, sharp, astute. The authorial trinity brings together some of the most accomplished voices in their respective disciplines in powerful counterpoint. -Yvonne Sherwood
Both seduced by Augustine's text and seducing it in return, as they themselves confess, the authors offer a provocative and enticingly fresh guide through Augustine's Confessions. Compelling and compellingly varied, their readings highlight the excess, paradox, and performative quality that mark the complex eroticism of Augustine's great work. This volume is a deeply insightful set of studies, well-theorized and thoroughly interdisciplinary.-Patricia Cox Miller
About the Author
Virginia Burrus is Professor of Early Church History at Drew University Theological School. Her books include Toward a Theology of Eros: Transfiguring Passion at the Limits of Discipline (Fordham; co-edited with Catherine Keller).
Mark D. Jordan is R. R. Niebuhr Professor of Divinity at Harvard Divinity School. The most recent of his books is Blessing Same-Sex Unions: The Perils of Queer Romance and the Confusions of Christian Marriage. Karmen MacKendrick is Joseph C. Georg Professor in the Philosophy Department at Le Moyne College. Her most recent book is Fragmentation and Memory (Fordham).