Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Marian Poem-Prayers in the Modern Age: Real Assent

Marian Poem-Prayers in the Modern Age: Real Assent

Ward, Jean

Hardcover

Series: New Directions in Religion and Literature

Literary CriticismPoetry Criticism

ISBN10: 1350507377
ISBN13: 9781350507371
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
Published: Nov 13 2025
Pages: 224
Weight: 1.08
Height: 0.56 Width: 6.14 Depth: 9.21
Language: English

This book explores a range of twentieth and twenty-first century poem-prayers directed to or involving Mary. In readings of works by T. S. Eliot, David Jones, Geoffrey Hill, Elizabeth Jennings, Hilary Davies, Rowan Williams and others, Ward traces the resurgence of interest in Mary from the late nineteenth century to the present day.

By the early twentieth century, the once widespread and fervent cult of the Virgin Mary had for more than three hundred years been largely absent from England's religious life. Similarly, the figure of Mary had almost vanished from English poetry, only to return, gradually, as Marian devotion began to revive in the nineteenth century.

The perception of this devotion as somehow un-English, dominant since the Reformation, presented a challenge to poets engaged with the Marian theme in the modern day. Marian Poem-Prayers in the Modern Age examines how male and female poets from both Roman Catholic and Anglican backgrounds responded to this situation. The book also argues that the figure of Mary is a type of John Henry Newman's category of real assent commitment that is not merely intellectual, but involves the totality of a person's being in relation to God.

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