Flashes of Fire: A Literary Analysis of the Song of Songs

Research output: Book/ReportBookpeer-review

Abstract

The essence of true love is in the yearning not in the consummation.

This literary analysis of the Song of Songs employs the methods of New Criticism. Each analysis aims to uncover the messages conveyed by the poems and the inner world of the characters. The analysis brings to the fore the highly sophisticated and the original creativity of the love poetry of the Song of Songs. In the introduction, the question is posed as to whether the Song of Songs is an anthology or one literary whole. After discussing the strengths and weakness of the various approaches, the author proposes a novel structure for the Book predicated on the various genres of the love poems.

Assis discerns poems of physical description, poems of adoration, and poems of yearning. In addition, he discerns what he takes to be a previously unrecognized genre, poems of rendezvous - a new structure which is based on a psychological understanding of passionate love is now discovered.
Original languageEnglish
PublisherBloomsbury Publishing
Number of pages304
ISBN (Print)9780567027641
StatePublished - 1 Sep 2009

Keywords

  • Bible
  • interpretation
  • Literary analysis
  • Song of Songs

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