God's Secretaries: The Making of the King James BibleHarper Collins, 2009 M10 13 - 336 pages NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK “This scrupulously elegant account of the creation of what four centuries of history has confirmed is the finest English-language work of all time, is entirely true to its subject: Adam Nicolson’s lapidary prose is masterly, his measured account both as readable as the curious demand and as dignified as the story deserves.” — Simon Winchester, author of Krakatoa In God's Secretaries, Adam Nicolson gives a fascinating and dramatic account of the era of the King James Bible and its translation, immersing us in an age whose greatest monument is not a painting or a building but a book. A network of complex currents flowed across Jacobean England. This was the England of Shakespeare, Jonson, and Bacon; the era of the Gunpowder Plot and the worst outbreak of the plague. Jacobean England was both more godly and less godly than the country had ever been, and the entire culture was drawn taut between these polarities. This was the world that created the King James Bible. It is the greatest work of English prose ever written, and it is no coincidence that the translation was made at the moment "Englishness," specifically the English language itself, had come into its first passionate maturity. The English of Jacobean England has a more encompassing idea of its own scope than any form of the language before or since. It drips with potency and sensitivity. The age, with all its conflicts, explains the book. This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more. |
From inside the book
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... written , passionately felt . . . . [ Nicolson ] is a skilled storyteller , and he compacts large amounts of research into alluring anec- dotal packets . " -The New Yorker 4 - Eldr . 6 . 47 . Or ,. " Nicolson makes that faraway.
... written companion to make its whole cre- ation come bursting alive is its own small miracle . " --JOHN FRASER , National Post ( Canada ) " Does a wonderful job of describing ... a masterpiece of majestic and muscular prose that became ...
... written permis- sion except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews . For information address HarperCollins Publishers , 10 East 53rd Street , New York , NY 10022 . HarperCollins books may be purchased ...
... these men made together can lay claim to be the greatest work in prose ever written in English . That it should be the creation of a committee of people no one has ever heard of - and who were generally unacknowledged at the time xi ...
... Tempest - all centred on the ambivalences of power , the rights of the individual will , the claims of authority and the question of liberty of conscience - were written and xiii staged for the first time . The questions that would Preface.
Contents
1 | |
20 | |
He sate among graue learned and reuerend | 42 |
Faire and softly goeth | 62 |
am for the medium in all things xi I | 84 |
20 | 85 |
The danger never dreamt of that is the danger | 105 |
O lett me bosome thee lett me preserve thee next to my heart | 117 |
The grace of the fashion of | 198 |
Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut vp his tender mercies? | 216 |
APPENDICES | 228 |
A The Sixteenthcentury Bible | 247 |
Chronology | 261 |
62 | 274 |
105 | 276 |
ལུ༠ཚŞརྗེནི ཝིཛྫིཥྞཾ 117 137 147 | 277 |
We have twice and thrice so much scope for oure earthlie peregrination | 137 |
When we do luxuriate and grow riotous in the gallantnesse of this world | 147 |
True Religion is in no way a gargalisme only | 173 |
173 | 278 |
216 | 280 |