Pastors in the Classics: Timeless Lessons on Life and Ministry from World Literature

Throughout the history of English literature, church ministers have figured prominently in novels, plays, morality tales, and even poetry. Pastors in the Classics is a unique, unprecedented collection of relevant literary masterpieces in which the pastor's experience is a major part of the story.

Part 1 is a reader's guide to twelve important classics written over four centuries and covering seven different nationalities. Each chapter not only describes and interprets the work in question, it also highlights a specific feature of pastoral ministry explored in the work. Part 2 is a handbook that defines the canon of literary masterpieces that deal with the pastor's experience, offering reading suggestions for both ministers and lovers of literature.

From the familiar (The Canterbury Tales; Cry, the Beloved Country; and The Scarlet Letter) to the lesser-known (Silence, Witch Wood) to the surprising (A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man), this collection uncovers the good, the bad, and the ugly ways in which pastors have been presented to the reading public for the past half millennium.

Leland Ryken (PhD, University of Oregon) is the Clyde S. Kilby Professor of English at Wheaton College and author or editor of more than thirty books, as well as many articles. He is also a member of the Evangelical Theological Society and lives in Illinois.

Philip Ryken (DPhil, University of Oxford, England) is president of Wheaton College. He was formerly senior minister of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books and lives with his family in Illinois.

Todd Wilson (PhD, Cambridge University) is senior pastor of Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park, Illinois, and lives with his family in Illinois.