From the depths of sorrow following the sudden death of her closest female mentor, Brenda Hillman asks anguished questions in this book of poems about separation, spiritual transcendence, and the difference between life and death. Both personal and philosophical, her work can be read as a spirit-guide for those mourning the loss of a loved one and as a series of fundamental ponderings on the inevitability of death and separation. At first refusing to let go, desperate to feel the presence of her friend, the poet seeks solace in a belief in the spirit world. But life, not death, becomes the issue when she begins to see physical existence as "an interruption" that preoccupies us with shapes and borders. "Shape makes life too small," she realizes. Comfort at last comes in the idea of "reverse seeing": that even if she cannot see forward into the spirit world, her friend can see "backward into this world" and be with her. Death Tractates is the companion volume to a philosophical poetic work entitles Bright Existence, which Hillman was in the midst of writing when her friend died. Published by Wesleyan University Press in 1993, it shares many of the same Gnostic themes and sources.

In this volume, which concludes John W. Rettig's translation of St. Augustine's Tractates on the Gospel of John, Augustine applies his keen insight and powers of rhetoric to the sacred text, drawing the audience into an intimate contemplation of Jesus through the course of his Passion, Death, and Resurrection.

Poetry in America is flourishing in this new millennium and asking serious questions of itself: Is writing marked by gender and if so, how? What does it mean to be experimental? How can lyric forms be authentic? This volume builds on the energetic tensions inherent in these questions, focusing on ten major American women poets whose collective work shows an incredible range of poetic practice. Each section of the book is devoted to a single poet and contains new poems; a brief "statement of poetics" by the poet herself in which she explores the forces — personal, aesthetic, political — informing her creative work; a critical essay on the poet's work; a biographical statement; and a bibliography listing works by and about the poet. Underscoring the dynamic give and take between poets and the culture at large, this anthology is indispensable for anyone interested in poetry, gender and the creative process. CONTRIBUTORS: Rae Armantrout, Mei-mei Berssenbrugge, Lucie Brock Broido, Jorie Graham, Barbara Guest, Lyn Hejinian, Brenda Hillman, Susan Howe, Ann Lauterbach, Harryette Mullen.

This concise volume provides a lucid introduction to the genesis and development of Rabbinic Judaism. Jacob Neusner outlines and examines the four stages in which the initial period of the historical development of Rabbinic Judaism divides, beginning with the Pentateuch and ending with its definitive and normative statement in the Talmud of Babylonia. He traces the development of Rabbinic Judaism by exploring the relationships between and among the cognate writings which embody its formative history.

In The Theology of the Oral Torah Neusner crafts the central conceptions of rabbinic Judaism into a rigorous, coherent argument by setting forth four cogent principles: that God formed creation in accord with a plan which the Torah reveals; that the perfection of creation is signified by the conformity of human affairs to a few enduring paradigms that transcend change; that Israel's condition, public and personal, is indicative of flaws in creation; and that God will ultimately restore the perfection embodied in his plan for creation. A masterful and original construction of theology of rabbinic Judaism, Neusner's story of the Oral Torah is also remarkably familiar - the emphasis is still on man's sin and God's response, God's justice and mercy, and the human mirroring of God through the possession of the power of will. The Theology of the Oral Torah is part of Neusner's ongoing major project - the construction of theology of rabbinic Judaism - a project which rivals in its scope that of the great Maimonides or, in Christian theology, that of Thomas Aquinas's Summa.