literature, science, religion: book review

[pynchonoid]

Some of you will find this review, and the book
reviewed, of interest, I expect:

Edith L. Blumhofer, ed. Religion, Education, and the
American Experience: Reflections on Religion and
American Public Life. Religion and American Culture
Series. Tuscaloosa and London: University of Alabama
Press, 2002. x + 246 pp. Tables, notes, index. $34.95
(cloth), ISBN 0-8173-1146-7. 

Reviewed by David R. Bains, Department of Religion,
Samford University.
Published by H-AmRel (July, 2003) 

[...] Roger Lundin's essay builds on Nord's by
examining how one secular way of thinking, modern
science, has affected literature, an academic
discipline often seen as more closely related to
religion. Surveying the whole modern era, Ludin shows
how literature has variously sought to present itself
as an alternative to science, to legitimate itself on
scientific grounds, or, paradoxically, to do both. In
the latter part of the essay, Ludin rejects the
"'strong' textualist" position represented by Richard
Rorty that regards science as simply another form of
textuality and therefore subordinate to literature as
a discipline (p. 60). Finally, Ludin examines the work
of four poets to show how Christians can use
literature to respond to the knowledge of the world
opened by science through ethical reflection and
playful creativity. [...] 

<http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=189081061957202>

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