An erudite but highly readable analysis of a universal symbol of Christianity.
Debut author Mages explores the history and symbolism of the Christmas crèche.
Although Nativity scenes have become a time-honored tradition among Christians of all denominations, this book seeks to “retrieve the manger scene from its comfortable niche beneath the tinsel-laden tree and hold it up to the light.” With painstaking attention to the minutiae of Nativities, Mages offers a refreshingly detailed look at a cultural artifact that’s long been admired for its simplicity. The author begins with a history of the Christmas crèche from Pope Sixtus III’s fifth-century wooden replica to the forerunners of today’s Nativity scene, which is traditionally attributed to St. Francis of Assisi. Subsequent chapters look at cultural differences in crèche design, from the German/Austrian traditional emphasis on detailed landscapes to the contrasting styles of Neapolitan and Provençal crèches, which, respectively, feature figures clothed in bright colors and “peasant garb.” The author offers chapter-length analyses of the symbolism behind the designs of Mary, Joseph, the shepherds, and the Magi. Even the animals, which modern Christians may overlook as merely part of the mise-en-scène, are given their proper due, as Mages surveys the writings of St. Augustine and other Christian patriarchs who suggested that each animal has a specific, symbolic purpose. The book is written by a Christian author with an expressed purpose of challenging readers to reflect on the Christmas season, and it includes some critical insights. It highlights, for example, the contradiction between the Magi’s following a star to Jesus and the Old Testament’s ban on divination and astrology. Like crèches themselves, the book is deliberately ecumenical, careful to highlight Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant thinkers. It’s also well researched, as evidenced in its impressive endnotes and bibliography, and it expertly walks the line between sophisticated analysis and accessibility. Unfortunately, although it cites numerous examples of crèche art and styles, it provides only a handful of generic images, depriving readers of visual examples.
An erudite but highly readable analysis of a universal symbol of Christianity.Pub Date: July 8, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-973694-20-5
Page Count: 244
Publisher: Westbow Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 8, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
For Howard Zinn, long-time civil rights and anti-war activist, history and ideology have a lot in common. Since he thinks that everything is in someone's interest, the historian—Zinn posits—has to figure out whose interests he or she is defining/defending/reconstructing (hence one of his previous books, The Politics of History). Zinn has no doubts about where he stands in this "people's history": "it is a history disrespectful of governments and respectful of people's movements of resistance." So what we get here, instead of the usual survey of wars, presidents, and institutions, is a survey of the usual rebellions, strikes, and protest movements. Zinn starts out by depicting the arrival of Columbus in North America from the standpoint of the Indians (which amounts to their standpoint as constructed from the observations of the Europeans); and, after easily establishing the cultural disharmony that ensued, he goes on to the importation of slaves into the colonies. Add the laborers and indentured servants that followed, plus women and later immigrants, and you have Zinn's amorphous constituency. To hear Zinn tell it, all anyone did in America at any time was to oppress or be oppressed; and so he obscures as much as his hated mainstream historical foes do—only in Zinn's case there is that absurd presumption that virtually everything that came to pass was the work of ruling-class planning: this amounts to one great indictment for conspiracy. Despite surface similarities, this is not a social history, since we get no sense of the fabric of life. Instead of negating the one-sided histories he detests, Zinn has merely reversed the image; the distortion remains.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1979
ISBN: 0061965588
Page Count: 772
Publisher: Harper & Row
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1979
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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