Tag Archives: HarperCollins

The Nag Hammadi Library

The Nag Hammadi Library, edited by James M Robinson, the 1990 paperback from HarperCollins, is part of the collection at the Reading Room. There is a newer revision The Nag Hammadi Scriptures which may be of more current interest.

James M Robinson The Nag Hammadi Library from HarperCollins

“This revised, expanded, and updated edition of The Nag Hammadi Library is the only complete, one-volume, modern language version of the renowned library of fourth-century manuscripts discovered in Egypt in 1945.

First published in 1978, The Nag Hammadi Library launched modern Gnostic studies and exposed a movement whose teachings are in many ways as relevant today as they were sixteen centuries ago.

James M. Robinson’s updated introduction reflects ten years of additional researcha nd editorial and critical work. An afterword by Richard Smith discusses the modern relevance of Gnosticism and its influence on such writers as Voltaire, Blake, Melville, Yeats, Kerouac, and Philip K. Dick.

Acclaimed by scholars and general readers alike, The Nag Hammadi Library is a work of major importance to everyone interested in the evolution of Christianity, the Bible, archaeology, and the story of Western civilization.” — back cover


The Bloody Chamber and Other Adult Tales

Hermetic Library fellow T Polyphilus reviews The Bloody Chamber and other adult tales by Angela Carter:

Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber via HarperCollins

 

This collection of Carter’s short stories is made up of those which riff on traditional fairy tales and folklore. It includes multiple versions of “Beauty and the Beast” and “Little Red Riding Hood,” as well as “Puss in Boots,” Bluebeard, and others. The narrative tone ranges from a sort of mid-range erotic storytelling (in the title piece), to pretty hilarious banter (“Puss in Boots,” which thanks to the Shrek movies, my mind’s ear heard in the voice of Antonio Banderas), to surreal impressionism (“The Erlking”).

While these are construed as “adult tales” (and I would certainly hesitate to read them to children), they simply bring an adult perspective to the sort of questions and enigmas that have always lurked in such traditional stories. A few involve a little — very little — “updating,” in that there is occasionally a telephone mentioned, or some other piece of culture or technology to imply a twentieth-century setting. But on the whole, Carter keeps her subjects in the timeless realms of dream and desire.

Carter’s prose is luxuriant, and the brevity of these stories makes them apt bedtime reading from one grownup to another. [via]

 

 

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