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One of the twentieth century's most important poets, W. H. Auden stands as an eloquent example of an individual within whom thought and faith not only coexist but indeed nourish each other. This book explores in detail how Auden's religious faith helped him to come to terms with himself as an artist and as a man, despite his early disinterest in religion and his homosexuality. It shows also how Auden's Anglican faith informs, and is often the explicit subject of, his poetry and prose. The book discusses the poet's boyhood religious experience and the works he wrote before emigrating to the United States as well as his formal return to the Anglican Communion at the beginning of World War II. It then focuses on Auden's criticism and on neglected and underestimated works of the poet's later years. Through insightful readings of Auden's writings and biography, this book documents how Auden's faith and his religious doubt were the matrix of his work and life.

This challenge to prevailing views of New Testament sources argues that the origins of passages in the book of Acts are to be found not in early Christian legends but in the epics of Homer. The book focuses on four passages in the book of Acts, examines their potential parallels in the Iliad, and concludes that the author of Acts composed them using famous scenes in Homer's work as a model. Tracing the influence of passages from the Iliad on subsequent ancient literature, it shows how the story generated a vibrant, mimetic literary tradition long before Luke composed the Acts. Luke could have expected educated readers to recognize his transformation of these tales and to see that the Christian God and heroes were superior to Homeric gods and heroes. Building upon and extending previously adopted analytic methods, this book opens an appreciation not only of Acts but also of the composition of early Christian narrative in general.