History Archive

The Notorious Elizabeth Tuttle: Marriage, Murder, and Madness in the Family of Jonathan Edwards by Ava Chamberlain New York University Press, 2012 258 pages (hardcover) Available Amazon Powells Those who recognize the name Elizabeth Tuttle know her only as the paternal grandmother of colonial theologian Jonathan Edwards, a woman her grandson was raised to

I’ve long had a love for underdogs. I suppose it has something to do with being raised on Rocky movies and westerns, but I love the story of the person who accomplishes the unexpected and improbable. Anyone that turns the tables on the overly-entitled or powerful by fulfilling a legacy they chose for themselves

The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt W.W. Norton & Company, 2011 356 pages (Hardcover) Available Amazon Powell’s Some ideas are heralded with the blast of a trumpet and brazenly ushered in, but some are stumbled upon. In Stephen Greenblatt’s (John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University) now

Does Jesus wave to the International Space Station at his return? Is the horse he’s riding on a funky, but cool space-horse? Last fall I gave a lecture before the student body on the historical contexts behind ancient Christian ideas of the end of the world. My point at that time was that many

Postmodernism has demonstrated the power enculturation has over a person’s ability to examine the world impartially. Changing one’s view of the world—not just a single idea here or there, but a complete revamping of that mental map we use for understanding reality—does not come easily. When we write about “discarding images” on this blog,

The Last Nude by Ellis Avery Penguin, 2012 320 pages (hardcover) Available Amazon Powell’s IndieBound Paris in the Jazz Age. A backdrop to art, literature, fashion, music, sparkling cocktails, catty society, public sexuality, political intrigue, and parties so lavish that the famous guests compete to be the entertainment. Rafaela Fano, American and seventeen, arrives

There is perhaps no discussion more infused with controversy than that of personal identity—that theory concerned with what makes a person the same or different over time.

“Our personal philosophy of the meaning of life, of our role and responsibilities in life, and of how the world really works…has an impact on our historical philosophy,” writes Hoefferle...."