The Writing on the Wall: High Art, Popular Culture and the Bible

Description

In an increasingly secularised society, the average person is unlikely to have a working knowledge of the Bible. Yet a great deal of our culture is built on stories or ideas that come from the Bible. Literature, art, music, language and even the fabric of our society - such as our justice system - is built on Christian concepts and biblical references. THE WRITING ON THE WALL provides a fascinating introduction to the Bible's best-known, and most influential, stories. Each chapter gives the full text of a story from the Bible and explains its original significance, then shows how this story has become enmeshed in Western culture. Adam and Eve, the ten plagues of Egypt, The Prodigal Son and Mary Magdalene all feature - along with how the Bible has influenced everyone from Shakespeare to Ian McEwan, and The Beatles to Monty Python. THE WRITING ON THE WALL opens up not just the Bible but also much of popular culture, and is for the everyday reader as well as the churchgoer.

After spending a number of years working as a singer, writer and musician in the field of contemporary music, Maggi Dawn was ordained into the Anglican Church in 1999. Having been Chaplain and Fellow at Robinson College, Cambridge, she is now Dean of Marquand Chapel and Associate Professor at Yale Divinity School. An occasional broadcaster for BBC Radio 4 Religion, she is a regular speaker at Greenbelt Festival and a wide range of venues around the world. Her books include [i]Beginnings[/i], [i]Giving it up[/i] and THE WRITING ON THE WALL.

This is no mean feat ... a treasure trove ... extremely readable. - Evangelicals Now Written in a lively and readable style by the multi-talented Dawn...certain to open up her writing to a whole new audience. - Church Times