Books written by Alan Jacobs

The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C. S. Lewis

Traces the life of the twentieth-century Christian literary master, drawing on themes from the Narnia series to offer insight into Lewis's experiences, from his work as a medieval scholar to his role as a beloved children's book author.
How to Think: A Survival Guide for a World at Odds

Thirty years ago, when the anthropologist Susan Friend Harding began seriously to study American fundamentalist Christianity—study that eventuated in a remarkable account, The Book of Jerry Falwell: Fundamentalist Language and ...
Myrobalan of the Magi

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Original Sin: A Cultural History

the basilica of a North African city called Hippo Regius, the bishop was preaching. The city stood on the rocky Mediterranean coast a hundred miles or so west of Carthage, in what is now the northeastern corner of Algeria.
The Book of Common Prayer: A Biography

Jacobs shows how The Book of Common Prayer--from its beginnings as a means of social and political control in the England of Henry VIII to its worldwide presence today--became a venerable work whose cadences express the heart of religious ...
The House on the Moor

OK?' Gary watched them leave, relieved that one plumbing job had gone off well. Dave came over to him. 'Your toilet bowl needs a good clean. I'll use some spirits of salts to descale it. I've checked the pipe leading away from it.
How to Think: A Survival Guide for a World at Odds

Examines the forces that prevent modern people from thinking, including distraction, social bias, and fear of rejection, and offers tips to regain a rational mental life.
How to Think: A Guide for the Perplexed

Finally, thinking is slow, and that's a problem when our habits of consuming information (mostly online) leave us lost in the echo chamber of social media, where speed and factionalism trump accuracy and nuance.In this clever, witty book, ...
The Year of Our Lord 1943: Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis

The Year of Our Lord 1943 tells the story of how five Christian intellectuals - Jacques Maritain, T. S. Eliot, C. S. Lewis, W. H. Auden, and Simone Weil - sought to provide a plan for the moral and spiritual renewal of the Western ...
Breaking Bread with the Dead: A Reader's Guide to a More Tranquil Mind

In Breaking Bread with the Dead, a gifted scholar draws us into close and sympathetic engagement with texts from across the ages, including the work of Anita Desai, Henrik Ibsen, Jean Rhys, Simone Weil, Edith Wharton, Amitav Ghosh, Claude ...
The Narnian

Traces the life of the twentieth-century Christian literary master, drawing on themes from the Narnia series to offer insight into Lewis's experiences, from his work as a medieval scholar to his role as a beloved children's book author.
The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction

Americans are not reading enough, they say, or reading the right books, in the right way.In this book, Alan Jacobs argues that, contrary to the doomsayers, reading is alive and well in America.
The Essential Gnostic Gospels: Including the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Mary Magdalene

Alan Jacobs brings his unrivalled scholarship to bear on these illuminating and eye-opening works, offering inspiring and poetic translations that capture the verses’ uplifting spiritual message and beauty.
What Became of Wystan

In this lucid and balanced treatise, Alan Jacobs reveals the true parameters of Auden's change after the poet's move to America in 1939.
Looking Before and After: Testimony and the Christian Life

This book reinvigorates narrative theology and helps to demonstrate the power of individual life stories when they are properly told and properly understood.
Wayfaring: Essays Pleasant and Unpleasant

Presents a collection of essays and book reviews covering a variety of topics in religion, philosophy, and literature.
Eutopia: The Gnostic Land of Prester John

"Enthralling and adventurous Utopian novella exploring the up to now undiscovered land of the legendary emperor Prester John, found in Ethiopia"--P. [4] of cover.
Breaking Bread with the Dead: A Literary Guide to Peace in the Present

Should we still bother with the supposedly great works of past ages? Aristotle believed that men were naturally superior to women. Kant wrote that 'Humanity is at its greatest perfection...
Sri Ramana Maharshi

He is the most intimate being, our very Self." - V. 58, Sri Ramana Ashtottara Sri Ramana Maharshi, the sage of Arunachala - the holy mountain of Lord Shiva, was one of the world's most influential spiritual teachers of our time.
A Theology Of Reading: The Hermeneutics Of Love

If the whole of the Christian life is to be governed by the "law of love"—the twofold love of God and one's neighbor—what might it mean to read lovingly? That is the question that drives this unique book.