Synopses & Reviews
From the early narratives of such colonial writers as Jonathan Edwards to the more recent conversion experiences of Jim Bakker, Jerry Falwell, and Pat Robertson, America is rich in both conversions and autobiographies. This volume provides a sourcebook for the study of American religious conversion narratives. It includes entries providing biographical, bibliographic, and critical commentary on thirty significant writers of conversion narratives. The subjects include writers of early colonial America, such as Mary Rowlandson and John Woolman, nineteenth-century women writers, such as Carry Nation and Ann Eliza Young, and writers from the twentieth-century social gospel movement, such as John Cogley and Dorothy Day. Chapters on subjects such as Jim Bakker give insight into the rise of televangelism. Finally, chapters on such writers as Frederick Douglass, Eldridge Cleaver, and Piri Thomas cover the conversion experiences of those who lived outside mainstream American culture.
The chapters are arranged alphabetically. Each one is divided into sections providing a short biography, discussing the narrative, covering criticism of the narrative, and a bibliography. The work concludes with a bibliographic essay and a full subject index.
Review
It is also a different sourcebook in that not all of the conversion experiences related are of the standard religious kind (e.g., among the listings is Peter Jenkins, A Walk Across America, as one would expect given the title of the book. Therefore, this well-written work should probably be aimed toward the library market, particularly college libraries, as well as the smaller libraries of departments of religious studies.Syzygy
Review
a concise, eloquently written, and scholarly volume. Recommended for college, university, and community libraries.ARBA
Review
Holte has contributed a helpful resource that should suggest and facilitate any number of research assignments for teachers and their students in classes of American history and literature. Libraries would do well to add this book.Fides Et Historia
Review
Holte's book does offer and introduction to the 'kaleidoscope' of religious experience in America. Quite thorough bibliographies appear after each essay. Furthermore the volume is a helpful reference work to religious autobiography that deserves a place in libraries committed to providing resources on the American religious experience.Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
Review
...a fascinating insight into North American socio-religous history, and a timely reminder of the cultural context in which North American Christians are commissioned to proclaim and embody the gospel. The strength of the volume is its historiographical integrity. Holte gives his subjects full and free expression, thereby allowing them to testify to a wide range of transforming experiences.Missology
Synopsis
This volume provides a sourcebook for the study of American religious conversion narratives. It includes chapters on 30 significant writers of conversion narratives, such as Mary Rowlandson, Carry Nation, Dorothy Day, Jim Bakker, Frederick Douglass, Eldridge Cleaver, and Piri Thomas.
Synopsis
This volume provides a sourcebook for the study of American religious conversion narratives. It includes chapters, arranged alphabetically, on 30 significant writers of conversion narratives including early colonial writers, such as Mary Rowlandson, 19th-century women writers, such as Carry Nation, 20th-century social gospel writers, such as Dorothy Day, writers from the age of televangelism, such as Jim Bakker, and writers from outside the mainstream of American culture, such as Frederick Douglass, Eldridge Cleaver, and Piri Thomas. Each entry provides a short biography, discussions of the narrative and the critical response, and a bibliography.
About the Author
JAMES CRAIG HOLTE is Associate Professor of English at East Carolina University.
Table of Contents
Preface
Introduction: Autobiography and Conversion
Jim Bakker, Move That Mountain
Lyman Beecher, The Autobiography of Lyman Beecher
Black Elk, Black Elk Speaks
Eldridge Cleaver, Soul on Fire
John Cogley, A Canterbury Tale: Experiences and Reflections: 1916-1976
Charles W. Colson, Born Again
Nicky Cruz, Run, Baby, Run
Mary Francis Clare Cusack, The Nun of Kenmare
Dorothy Day, The Long Loneliness
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave: Written by Himself
Jonathan Edwards, Personal Narrative
Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African
Jerry Falwell, Strength for the Journey
Charles Grandison Finney, The Memoirs of Charles Grandison Finney
Alexander Irvine, From the Bottom Up
Rebecca Cox Jackson, Gifts of Power: The Writings of Rebecca Jackson, Black Visionary, Shaker Eldress
Peter Jenkins, A Walk Across America
Malcolm X, The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Aimee Semple McPherson, In the Service of the King
Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain
William Miller, Apology and Defense
Carry Nation, The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation
Daniel Alexander Payne, Reflections of Seventy Years
Pat Robertson, Shout It from the Housetops
Mary Rowlandson, The Sovereignty and Goodness of God, Together with the Faithfulness of His Promises Displayed; Being a Narrative of the Captivity and Restauration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson
Thomas Shepard, The Autobiography of Thomas Shepard
Piri Thomas, Down These Mean Streets
Alan Watts, In My Own Way
John Woolman, The Journal of John Woolman
Ann Eliza Young, Life in Mormon Bondage: A Complete Expose of Its False Prophets, Murderous Danites, Despotic Rulers, and Hypnotized Deluded Subjects
Bibliographic Essay
Index