Children of Men
P.D. James is one of my favorite contemporary writers. She’s an octagenarian English woman who primarily writes detective novels. But anyone who’s ever read a P.D. James book knows that she’s not just another Stuart Woods or Michael Connelly. Her books are literature in the finest sense. She is also a Christian, a fact that any reader of her novels can discern.
But her most explicitly Christian novel was not a crime story. It was an unlikely sci-fi tale called The Children of Men
I recall starting to read this many yrs. ago, but never got very far (don’t remember why, but it certainly was NOT because it was boring, by any means!) I think at the time I sensed almost a prophetic theme to her prose. Now, I wonder how close she really was to predicting the “the last of the children of men”.
Carl
29 Jul 06 at 5:01 am
WOW. To hear you say this story (and, hopefully the resulting movie) has an explicitly Christian message blows my mind. I had watched the trailer yesterday (I know nothing about the story or it’s author) and the movie gave me the impression that it was a story with an objectivist, Ayn Rand “Atlas Shrugged” kind of point of view. I anticipated it to have a message about man needing to become his own God. That’s not the case? Please tell us a bit more.
Darrell
30 Jul 06 at 11:04 am
Darrell, It’s been a few years so I don’t recall too many details. It is an apocalyptic dystopia story that deals with the questions of the value of human life. I remember it as a profoundly pro-life book. And it has many overt theological considerations as well. I recall also that the book questions theological liberlaism’s ability to address life and death questions satisfactorily. Without giving away key plot elements, there are also numerous messianic parallels. I need to re-read the book before saying much more. And I just hope the film does it justice.
Pastor Scott Stiegemeyer
30 Jul 06 at 5:37 pm
Thanks for the rundown on the book. I am now officially going to comb half.com and try to grab a paperback. It sounds like my kind of book. On the rare occasion that I read fiction, I like to read allegorical stuff… and, unfortunately, CS Lewis only wrote a limited amount of fiction and a guy can only read “The Last Battle” so many times!
Total change of topic, but congrats on the Concordia Theological Seminary. I can’t help but be sure that this is the beginning of wonderful things for you and your family.
Darrell
30 Jul 06 at 7:56 pm