The life of Saint Teresa of Avila : a biography

The life of Saint Teresa of Avila A biography

Carlos M. N. Eire

Book - 2019

The Life of Saint Teresa of Avila is among the most remarkable accounts ever written of the human encounter with the divine. The Life is not really an autobiography at all, but rather a confession written for inquisitors by a nun whose raptures and mystical claims had aroused suspicion. Despite its troubled origins, the book has had a profound impact on Christian spirituality for five centuries, attracting admiration from readers as diverse as mystics, philosophers, artists, psychoanalysts, and neurologists. How did a manuscript once kept under lock and key by the Spanish Inquisition become one of the most inspiring religious books of all time? National Book Award winner Carlos Eire tells the story of this incomparable spiritual masterpiece..., examining its composition and reception in the sixteenth century, the various ways its mystical teachings have been interpreted and reinterpreted across time, and its enduring influence in our own secular age. The Life became an iconic text of the Counter-Reformation, was revered in Franco's Spain, and has gone on to be read as a feminist manifesto, a literary work, and even as a secular text. But as Eire demonstrates in this vibrant and evocative book, Teresa's confession is a cry from the heart to God and an audacious portrayal of mystical theology as a search for love. Here is the essential companion to the Life, one woman's testimony to the reality of mystical experience and a timeless affirmation of the ultimate triumph of good over evil.

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Subjects
Teresa, > of Avila, Saint, > 1515-1582.
Christian saints > Spain > 16th century > Biography.
Spiritual life > Catholic Church > Early works to 1800.
Biographies.
Genres
Biographies
Published
Princeton, New Jersey : Princeton University Press [2019]
Language
English
Main Author
Carlos M. N. Eire (author)
Physical Description
xvi, 260 pages : illustrations ; 20 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 245-250) and index.
ISBN
9780691164939
  • Preface: The character of the Vida
  • Chapter 1: Teresa's life story
  • Chapter 2: How, when, and why the book was written
  • Chapter 3: The mysticism of the Vida
  • Chapter 4: The life of the Vida, 1600-1800
  • Chapter 5: The life of the Vida in art
  • Chapter 6: From Enlightenment to modernity: skeptics, seekers, psychoanalysts, fascists
  • Chapter 7: The post-mystical intermillennial Vida
  • Epilogue: Doctor of the church, sign of contradiction.
Review by Choice Review

An established scholar of the European Reformation, Eire (Yale) has written a fascinating biography of Teresa of Avila's Libro de la vida (The Life of Teresa of Jesus), in which Teresa recounts the visions and experiences she had while in the Avila cloister. The Vida, along with Teresa's The Interior Castle, is widely read in many courses on Christianity. Eire puts Teresa in social and historical context while taking seriously her theological claims about the God whom she claimed appeared to her. After outlining the contents of the Vida, Eire explores the book's influence by tracing the time frame of printings and translations of the book across the centuries. He also looks at how images from Teresa's writings, and depictions of Teresa herself, evolved over time with paintings of various scenes and sculptures of Teresa and her work. Finally--in a chapter that is more directed at the scholarly guild but will nevertheless fascinate nonspecialists--Eire traces how political regimes, psychoanalysts, and historians have treated Teresa and Christian mysticism in general. Throughout, Eire's writing is lucid, at times witty, and he combines historical awareness with theological sensitivity. Readers interested in Christianity, mysticism, and theology will find this book both informative and engaging. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower- and upper-division undergraduates; graduate students; general readers. --Aaron Wesley Klink, Duke University

Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Eire (Waiting for Snow in Havana), National Book Award winner and professor of religious studies at Yale, explores a famous work by the 16th-century Carmelite nun St. Teresa of Avila in this fine history. Eire begins with the origin of Vida, (or The Life) which was her response to questions from Carmelite authorities about her mysticism during a period of religious conflict in Spain. Encompassing autobiography, mystical analysis, and prayer instruction, Vida satisfied the era's Carmelite Inquisitors, and after its publication in 1588 enjoyed what Eire calls a "bifurcated life." For some at the time, it was heresy, a view bolstered by its influence on controversial religious movements, including Quietism in 17th-century France. For early psychoanalysts, it was seen as the product of nymphomaniacal hysteria, and for Spanish Fascists during the Spanish Civil War, its author became a "nationalist racial avatar." But to modern "seekers" like St. Therese of Liseaux, Edith Stein, and Dorothy Day-and many other readers-it has been an accessible model of female devotional life and, more recently, a valuable source for scholars of women's writing. Whatever other motivations she had, Eire notes, "[Teresa] really loved writing, and excelled at it." Drawing connections between writers and readers that stretch across centuries, Eire provides an enthralling exploration of the life and influence of an important historical work. (June) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

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