Unafraid to be: a Christian study of contemporary English writing (I.V.P. pocketbook)

What is man? Who am I? What gives me identity? Is there an answer? These fundamental questions have occupied the attention of poets, dramatists and novelists of the last fifteen years. Some of them have expressed bitter anger at the superficial values of a hypocritical society. Some have faced despair at life's apparent meaninglessness. The result has been a determined attack through literature on the Establishment, and the rise of such movements as the Theatre of the Absurd. Other writers have tried to find constructive solutions. They have suggested that man's individual identity lies in the work he does, the values he holds, the relationships he enters into. Ruth Etchells, lecturer in English at Durham University, examines these trends in contemporary English literature, quoting frequently from writers of both verse and prose. She shows that the Christian, too, finds the clue to his identity, understands a meaning in life as a while, through a relationship. But this is not an unstable experience, at the mercy of man's changing feelings and affections: it is the sure relationship between man and God.