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A carregar... The Bible According to Mark Twain: Writings on Heaven, Eden and the Flood (edição 1996)por Howard G. Baetzhold (Herausgeber)
Informação Sobre a ObraThe Bible According to Mark Twain por Mark Twain
  
Nenhum(a) Ainda não há conversas na Discussão sobre este livro.   Melynn1104 | Jun 28, 2017 |   ) blake.rosser | Jul 28, 2013 | The book is divided into three sections. The first consists of extracts from the diaries of various Biblical characters, starting with Adam and Eve and continuing, somewhat haphazardly, up through accounts of a great pre-Flood civilization that bears a not entirely coincidental resemblance to Twain's own. The tone varies a lot through these, from sardonic commentary to delightfully silly humor to some passages that are really quite unironically touching. While Twain's writing is, as always, great, it's clear that most of this material never got finished and put together quite the way Twain would have liked it, making it a somewhat choppy and not entirely satisfying read. The second section deals with the concept of heaven, and includes two very similar stories about people dying and going to heaven (or dreaming they've died and gone to heaven), satirizing the somewhat unappealing popular conceptions of heaven as a rather limited little place full of harps, hymns, and halos, and not much else. There's also a bitingly funny little piece about an obnoxiously uncouth evangelist who enters heaven, immediately resulting in other people wanting to leave. The third section contains the longish "Letters from the Earth," in which Satan pays a visit to Earth and writes letters back to his buddies in heaven detailing these ridiculous humans' ridiculous ideas about religion. The editors quote Twain as saying "this book will never be published," and it's not too difficult to see why he'd think so. Where the earlier pieces are comparatively gentle in their criticisms of Christianity, in this one Twain looses the full force of his scathing, acidic wit on the Bible's logical and moral flaws, and takes no prisoners. Godless heathen that I am, I loved it to pieces. There is also a substantial set of appendices, which feature alternate versions of a few of these stories with deleted passages included, some of Twain's notes and outlines, and a couple of non-fictional excerpts in which he covers many of the same points the other works in this volume make, and which clarify his own essentially deistic take on religion. Rating: 4/5. Because even when he's not producing a polished finished product, Twain is awesome. ( )1  bragan | Apr 16, 2013 | ) Devil_llama | May 9, 2011 | If you like Twain, know your Bible, and have a healthy dose of religious skepticism, you'll love it. Actually, the only real essential to truly enjoying this is a smattering of Biblical knowledge, and a thick skin as regards blasphemy. But what else could you expect from Twain? Adam and Eve's respective diaries? Priceless. The original version of Mars/Venus. As someone that rereads and rereads Twain, I have tremendous affection for his style. This book, written toward the end of his life, shows the same sort of vivid sense of humor as The Innocents Abroad. (  )1 Oreillynsf | May 23, 2010 | sem críticas | adicionar uma crítica
This volume collects the most important writings by Mark Twain in which he used biblical settings, themes, and figures. Featuring Twain's singular portrayals of God, Adam, Eve, Satan, Methuselah, Shem, St. Peter, and others, the writings stand among Twain's most imaginative expressions of his views on human nature and humankind's relation to the Creator and the universe.
Composed over four decades (1871-1910), the writings range from farce to fantasy to satire, each one bearing the mark of Twain's unmistakable wit and insight. Among the many delights in store for readers are Adam and Eve's divergent accounts of their domestic troubles; Methuselah's discussion of an ancient version of baseball, complete with a parody of baseball jargon; Shem's hand-wringing account of how material shortages and labor troubles were hampering the progress of the ark his father, Noah, was building; a description of the disruptive actions of the fire-and-brimstone evangelist Sam Jones upon arriving in heaven; Captain Stormfield's revelations of what heaven is really like; Satan's musings on our puerile concepts of the afterlife; and Twain's advice on how to dress and tip properly in heaven.
Twain's humor, however, is never gratuitous. As readers laugh their way through this volume, they will find ample evidence of Twain's concerns about scriptural fallacies and inconsistencies, the Bible's rather flat portrayal of important characters, and our limited notions about the nature and meaning of our own - and God's - existence. Many of the pieces in this collection, even the most light-hearted, might still be considered controversial; of some of the darker pieces, Twain himself acknowledged that they would be heretical in any age. Moreover, these writings are valuable cultural artifacts of a time when, across the Western world, fundamental religious beliefs were being called into question by the precepts of Darwinism and the rapid advances of science and technology.
Several of this volume's selections are previously unpublished; others, like Letters from the Earth, are classics. Virtually all have been newly edited to reflect as closely as possible Twain's final intentions for their form and content. For serious Twain devotees, editors Howard G. Baetzhold and Joseph B. McCullough have supplied an abundance of background material on the writings, including details on the history of their composition, publication, and relevance to the Twain canon. Não foram encontradas descrições de bibliotecas. |
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