Wheat That Springeth Green (First Edition)

Powers, J F

ISBN 10: 0394496094 / ISBN 13: 9780394496092

Published by Knopf, New York, 1988

About this Item

New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988. First edition, stated. First printing. Hardcover. Quarter gray cloth over gray paper-covered boards, with silver spine lettering. Fine in a fine dust jacket. A bright, tight, clean copy with no chips or tears. Publisher's original price intact on jacket flap ($18.95). Comes with archival-quality mylar dust jacket protector. Octavo, 336 pages. This novel follows Father Joe Hackett from his idealistic youth through his middle years as a priest confronting the erosion of his faith and vocation. J. F. Powers (1917-1999) was an American novelist and short story writer whose earlier novel "Morte D'Urban" won the 1963 National Book Award. "Wheat That Springeth Green" was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1988 and was the author's fifth and final book. His complete works include: "Prince of Darkness and Other Stories" (1947); "The Presence of Grace" (1956); "Morte D'Urban" (1962); "Look How the Fish Live" (1975); and "Wheat That Springeth Green" (1988). Powers's legacy endures as that of a master stylist whose wry, exact portraits of Midwestern Catholic priests and laymen explore the moral tensions between faith, vocation, and worldly compromise. Though he published only five books, his precision, irony, and compassion secured his place among the most distinctive American fiction writers of the twentieth century.

Seller Inventory # Fiction-Powers-1

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Wheat That Springeth Green (First Edition)
• Publisher: Knopf, New York
• Publication Date: 1988
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0394496094
• ISBN 13: 9780394496092
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Fine

About this title

Synopsis

Presents Father Joe Hachett, the alcoholic, middle-aged pastor of a suburban church, who copes with his past, his transformed ideals, changing times, and a changing church

Reviews

Joe Hackett is a 44-year-old priest living in the Midwest in 1968. Once, when he was young and training for the priesthood, he was fanatical; he wore a hair shirt and gave up his vices: "smokes, sweets, snacks, snooker, and handball." Now he is middle-aged, comfortable and rather complacent, a bit of a Babbitt. He drinks too much, is overweight and over-concerned with appearances. He goes through the motions with his middle-class parish. Friction arises when a new assistant arrives. Just out of seminary, Bill hasin Joe's jaded eyescertain naive ideas. It's a gentlemanly conflict: the men like each other, and, as Joe cultivates their "priestly fellowship," through the upheavals of surreptitious parish fund-raising, a quiet evening drink or afternoon ball playing, he recognizes in his assistant his own idealistic, younger self. As a result of this introspection, and of the bureaucratic necessities that the structure of the church imposes, Joe changes from the middle-management timeserver he is surprised to realize he has become, to a less secular, more spiritual person. In his first novel in 25 years, since the National Book Award-winning Morte D'Urban , Powers writes in a casual, yet supple style. Brilliantly using details to illuminate both character and scene, and exhibiting an unerring ear for dialogue, reduced to its essentials, strikingly lifelike, often riotously funny, Powers succeeds in conveying the nuts and bolts of a clergyman's life even as he illuminates the hidden corners of his soul.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.