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Mysteries of the Monday night speech
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thomas Cahill is an engaging popular historian whose best-known work is probably “How the Irish Saved Civilization,” with sizable honorable mentions for “The Gifts of the Jews: How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels” and “Desire of the Everlasting Hills: The World Before and After Jesus.”
His most recent book, “Mysteries of the Middle Ages: The Rise of Feminism, Science and the Arts from the Cults of Catholic Europe,” which came out in 2006, didn’t generate quite the buzz those books did, but I found it to be packed full of fascinating historical connections.
As he did in “How the Irish Saved Civilization,” Cahill (a Catholic with issues with the Church) shines a light on the darker centuries, roughly 600-1400, in an attempt to show that a lot of what we value in modern times was born or nurtured then. It’s a nifty tour that takes in Dante. St. Francis of Assisi, Heloise and Abelard, and many more, and he has a real knack for bringing these people to life. In the end, I wasn’t sure that he had proven what he had set out to prove, but I had learned a bit and been entertained.
Cahill will talk tonight at 7:15 at the Decatur Presbyterian Church, then go right next door to the Decatur Library to sign his books. His website doesn’t give a clue what he will be speaking about; it might be “Mysteries of the Middle Ages,” or, since he’s so wide-ranging, just about anything else.
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