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How are well-known female characters from the Bible represented in late 20th-century novels? In Biblical Women in Contemporary Novels in English, Ingrid Bertrand presents a detailed analysis of biblical rewritings by Roberts, Atwood, Tennant, Diamant and Diski focusing on six different women (Eve, Noah's wife, Sarah, Bilhah, Dinah and Mary Magdalene). She shows how these heroines give themselves a voice that rests not only on words but also on silences. Exploring the many forms that silence can take, she presents an innovative typology that sheds new light on this profoundly meaningful phenomenon.

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Acknowledgements

List of Abbreviations

Introduction

1Setting the Frame. Voices and Silences



Part 1: The Silenced Feminine?

2Ambivalent Responses to the Bible

1Listening to the Implicit Dimension of the Bible

2Challenging Women''s Silencing

2.1Dumb Silencing

2.2Garrulous Silencing

2.3Deaf Silencing

3So Many Forms of Silencing to Denounce

1The Demoted, Repressed Feminine: The Wild Girl

2Amputated Subjecthood: The Handmaid''s Tale

3Boarding the Ark of the Refusees: The Book of Mrs Noah

4Beware of the Big Bad Lies: Sisters and Strangers

5The Voiceless Cipher in the Text: The Red Tent

6Battling Against God: Only Human

7Feminist Responses to Women''s Silencing



Part 2: Voices Draped in Silences

Section 1:Encountering the Other through Silences. Diamant''s the Red Tent
and Roberts''s the Wild Girl

4Dinah''s Ode to the Plural Mother

1A Universe of Mothers and Goddesses

2The Bliss and Burden of Silence

2.1In the Image of the (Great) Mother(s)

2.2From Eloquent Silence to Silencing

2.3At One with the Mothers

5Mary Magdalene''s Quest for Identity and God

1Introduction into the Ineffable Divine

1.1A Voluptuous Dissolution of the Self

1.2Ineffable Beauty and Harmony

2Regaining Primeval Wholeness

2.1Sexuality as a Route to the Divine

2.2The Marriage between the Inner Man and the Inner Woman

2.3The Rehabilitation of the Female Divine Principle

2.4Celebrating Life and the Eloquent Silence of Intimacy

3The Harrowing of Hell and Resurrection

3.1Mary Magdalene''s First Trip to the Nether Realm

3.2On the Erroneous Belief in the Bodily Resurrection

3.3Mary Magdalene''s Second Harrowing Scene

4The Voice of Female Dissent

4.1Each of Us Is the Rock

4.2Sailing in and to Silence

Section 2:Blurred Voices and Spectral Silences. Roberts''s the Book of Mrs Noah
and Diski''s Only Human

6Mrs Noah''s Journey to Creativity

1On the Polyphonic, Silent Use of Epigraphy

1.1Echoing Donne''s Erratic Progress of a Multiform Soul

1.2In the Image of ... Donne''s Soul: Outshining Noah''s Ark

1.3Sharing a Playful, Ironic Distance towards Authority

1.4Tempering with Donne''s Voice

2A Great Web of Blurred Voices

2.1Voice Blurring Across Narrative Levels

2.2Blurring within the Main Narrative Level

2.3A Mixture of Chaos and Rhythm Celebrating Plurality

2.4Delivered from Confinement, Delivered through Confinement?

2.5A Heavy Weight to Bear?

2.6Conjugating "To Come"

3Climbing Down Deep Inside, to Spectral Silence

3.1Partying with the Quintessential Silenced

3.2Speaking with(out) the Lost Mother

7Sarai''s Story Game of Competing Voices and Rival Desires

1Voice Blurring in a War of the Wor(l)ds

1.1At the Start, There Is an End

1.2Unidentified Narrative Voice for a Silenced Heroine

1.3Blurred Rival Versions of the Beginning(s)

2Sarai''s Early Encounter with Spectral Silence

2.1Primeval Loss and the Beginning of Desire

2.2The Beginning of the End, and Disappointing New Starts

3Sarai-Abram-God, a Destructive Triangular Desire

3.1When the One Finds Her Own Voice, the Other Finds God''s

3.2Enter I Am That I Am, the Homewrecker: Sarai Nil, God One

3.3The Battle of Wor(l)ds: Sarai One, God One

3.4The Choice of Laughter: Sarai Two, God One

Section 3:Reticent Testimonies. Atwood''s the Handmaid''s Tale and Tennant''s
Sisters and Strangers

8Offred''s Reticent Tale of Resistance

1An Introduction to Reticence

2Offred''s Polyphonic Testimony

2.1Dialoguing with the Narratee(s)

2.2Passing On Other Mutinous Female Voices

2.3Offred''s Chatty Discourse with the Maker

3Fighting for a Plurality of Identities and Meanings

3.1Remembering Her Former Selves

3.2Games of Words, Power and Desire with the Commander

3.3Offred as Secret Lover

9The Playfully Reticent Tale of Eve''s Journey

1An Introduction into Grandmother Dummer''s Reticence

2From the Passive Princess to the Demonic Lilith

3Subverting the Extremes: From Harlot to Madonna

4Female Lies and Truths: From Courtesan to Bluestocking



Part 3: Closing Silences Voicing Openness

10Passing on the Heroine''s Voice

1Mary Magdalene''s Distrust of Words

2Eve''s Ultimate Subversive Enactment of Female Stereotypes

3Sarai and the Ineffable Human Horror

4Dinah''s Life Beyond the Grave

5The Irreconcilability of Mrs Noah''s Aspirations?

6Offred''s Blurred Voice

11Conclusion

Works Cited

Index