On evil by Terry Eagleton

In popular discourse, Evil is unintelligible. The less intelligible an act is the more evil the act becomes. This accounts for the common-sense notion in which evil has come to mean ‘without a cause’. The contradiction in our current usage is that we then proceed to explain the unintelligible. The explanation often rests on something that is actually beyond the control of the actor: i.e., they *are* evil rather than what they have done is an evil act. When such discourses are used it is often in an effort to debunk the connection between environment (i.e., poverty, abuse, etc.) and replace it with another cause (i.e., character). In this way we throw out one cause only to replace by another more mysterious cause located in the opacity of the self.

The Unsettling of America by Wendell Berry

The Unsettling of America is still, despite being quite dated, an important call to practice an ethic of kindly care in our interaction with the earth. Yet, as Berry argues, this ethic is profoundly difficult to realise because of the fractured quality of our identity and also our relationships with each other and the environment.

While earlier chapters work to layout the assumptions that drive the analysis in the latter parts of the book, I found these the most engaging and persuasive components. He seems at his most forceful when he allows the self-evident nature of the conclusions to stand on their own. However, his incisive critique of agribusiness and the agricultural policy of the United States still resonates, even if matters have changed somewhat.

The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne

For a committed, institutional Christian there is something deeply unnerving about Shane Claiborne’s ‘Irresistible Revolution’.  Not only does Claiborne offer a call to sever our attachment to the insularity of faith – and thereby radically reconfigures our conception of community – but it also seeks to destabilise the security of faith by opening up questions about our reading of the life of Jesus.

Rocks of Ages by Stephen Jay Gould

Gould’s book is enlightening and generous; and which has certainly been influential in recent discussions of science and religion. Despite Dawkins incredulity, Gould’s position does possess a certain parsimony and beauty. Moreover, those Mormons familiar with Lowell Bennion will feel a sense of déjà vu while reading Gould’s monograph. These issues aside, I want to explore in some detail the ways in which the NOMA push against each other, for as Gould argues ‘if some contradiction seems to emerge between a well-validated scientific result and a conventional reading of scripture, then we had better reconsider our exegesis, for the natural world does not lie’ (p. 21).

On Shared Suffering: Room by Emma Donoghue

[Spoiler Alert]

The intimacy of shared pain is a recurring theme through ‘Room’. Similar life experiences create rich and ennobling connections with people,  but our different responses to painful experience inevitably drag others through our own recounting or re-living of an event. ‘Room’ asks question about how we respond to suffering in the context of other people who we care about.

David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism by Gregory Prince & Wm. Robert Wright

This is a singularly important book primarily because of the source material. It is based upon the diaries of McKay’s long-serving, private secretary, Clare Middlemiss, and therefore provides intimate and detailed access to minutes from the First Presidency meetings, private letters and other sensitive materials. The topically–themed chapters provide a vigorous, though at times repetitive, panorama of McKay’s 20 year service as Church President. A number of important themes could be discussed, and have been elsewhere, but I want to focus upon just one: dissonance among the brethren.

The Theory of the Leisure Class by Thorstein Veblen

Two primary reactions framed my cursory reading of Veblen’s seminal text. First, it was surprising how much of his thesis has become ‘accepted wisdom’ in the Leisure studies research literature. Second, it was unnerving how well he seems to have captured the field of Leisure studies without any empirical evidence, he seems to be the consummate ‘armchair sociologist’. However, both of these reactions are tied to the downfalls of the text.

Joseph Smith, Jesus and Satanic Opposition: Atonement, Evil and the Mormon Vision by Douglas J. Davies

Davies argues that Mormonism’s force as a religion is intelligible through a relational trinity (Jesus, Satan and Joseph Smith) evoked in three paradigmatic scenes: the Grand Council, Gethsemane and the Sacred Grove.  This intelligibility makes Mormonism Plan of Salvation both accessible and appealing.  Davies’ attempts to speak to and through a form of Mormonism which is now fading, or at least shifting, gives this text a liminal quality.  He attributes some of the major shifts in LDS ecclesiology and theology to the reconfiguration of this trinity.  And yet, despite being focussed upon Mormonism’s past, his book sensitises members of the Church, and interested observers, to those changes currently occurring.

Pre-postcolonialism: Postcolonialism by Robert J. C. Young

Not enough praise could be expressed for Oxford University Press’ ‘Very Short Introductions’.  They provide excellent surveys of a field of study with just enough depth to sensitise the reader to the potential of a set of disciplinary tools.  Unfortunately, praise for the series as a whole cannot be applied to every book.  Robert J. C. Young’s addition to the series is one those texts that does what it promised but in a fashion which seems alien to its topic.

The Ecstasy of Sanctimony: The Human Stain by Philip Roth

The third-part of Roth’s second Zuckerman trilogy (The Human Stain) was written in the context of America’s obsession with Clinton’s affair and considers Identity politics in American life.  Roth uses Zuckerman’s portrayal of Coleman Silk’s racial deceit as a back-drop to explore ‘America’s oldest communal passion… its most treacherous and subversive pleasure: the ecstasy of sanctimony’ (p. 2).