 Posted Tuesday, December 27, 2005 8:06 PM
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I have finished reading a new biography of Mrs. Eddy by the late Stephen Gottschalk, entitled Rolling Away the Stone: Mary Baker Eddy's Challenge to Materialism. Gottschalk finished the book right before his death in January 2005. While it covers all of Mrs. Eddy's life, it particularly focuses on her last two decades, and its structure is thematic, rather than strictly chronological. The book incorporates much new source material from the collection of The Mary Baker Eddy Library that has not been in print in a biography before.
I think that Gottschalk has written an outstanding biography of Mrs. Eddy, and feel that it is essential reading for anyone who wants to be up on the latest scholarship on Mrs. Eddy's life. I think that the book has great potential to enlighten and inspire those Christian Scientists who read it, as well as giving non-Christian Scientists who read it a more accurate and realistic assessment of her life than have many previous biographies.
Mary Farrell Bednarowski, a scholar in the field of women in American religious history is quoted on the back of the dust jacket of the book as follows:
In my experience, there has been no one better than Stephen Gottschalk at interpreting Christian Science: its fundamental teachings; its theological subtleties; and its place in American religious thought and culture. ... He addresses the complexities of her life with both sympathy -- by which I mean a willingness to understand her on her own terms -- and with astute, unflinching critique.
tmcl
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