The Judeo-Christian Strain -- The Divine Face and the Face-to-Face in the Bible -- Christ-Like and Compassionate Faces in Shakespeare's plays -- Christ's Face and its Adversaries in Dostoyevsky's The Idiot -- The Classical Strain -- Divine Faces and the Face-to-Face in Apuleius's Tale of Cupid and Psyche -- Syncretic Faces in Hermann Hesse's Demian -- Ancient and Christian Faces in C.S. Lewis's Till We Have Faces.
Summary:
"An important contribution to studies in literature and religion, The Divine Face in Four Writers traces the influence of Christian and Classical prototypes in ideas and depictions of the divine face, and the centrality of facial expressions in characterization, in the works of William Shakespeare, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Herman Hesse, and C.S. Lewis. Maurice Hunt explores both the human yearning to see the divine face from post-Apostolic time to the 20th century, as reflected in religion, myth, and literature by writers such as Augustine, Shakespeare, Hardy and Dostoyevsky, as well as the significance of the hidden divine face in writings by Spenser, Milton, Hesse, and Lewis. A final coda briefly detailing Emmanuel Levinas's system of ethics, based on the human face and its encounters with other faces, allows Hunt to focus on specific moments in the writings of the four major writers discussed that have particular ethical value"-- Provided by publisher. "A comparative study that explores the influence of Christian and Classical ideas about the divine face in the writing of four major writers in Western literature"-- Provided by publisher.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.