The Sacred Desert Religion, Literature, Art, and Culture [Hardcover]

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• An original reflection on the role of the desert in theology, history, literature, art and film.
  
• Discusses figures as diverse as Jesus, the early Christian Desert Fathers, T.E. Lawrence, T.S. Eliot, Georgia O’Keeffe, Wim Wenders and Jim Crace.
  
• Makes connections across millennia of desert literature.
  
• Deepens the reader’s understanding of the desert as a real place, as an interior space, and as a textual site,
  
• Concludes with comments on the recent conflicts in Iraq.
  
• Written in a readable and engaging style.

Preface.

List of illustrations.

1. Introduction: Meeting Points.

2. The Bible, Schoenberg, and Heidegger.

3. The Desert Fathers: Wandering and Miracles.

4. Time and Memory, Wind and Space: The Desert and Mysticism.

5. Mysticism and Modernity: Thomas Merton meets Don Cupitt.

6. The Literature of the Desert: Travellers and Poets.

7. The Literature of the Desert: Novelists.

8. Artists: Georgia O'Keefe, Bill Viola and Abstract Expressionism.

9. Films of the Desert: Pier Paolo Pasolini, Wim Wenders, Claire Dennis.

10. Desert Theology and Total Presence: Poets William Blake, T.S. Eliot and Yves Bonnefoy meet Hegel and Altizer.

11. Conclusion: Meeting Point.

Postscript: The Desert and the Recent Wars in Iraq.

Bibliography.

Index