This classic biography was first published thirty years ago and has since established itself as the standard account of Saint Augustine's life and teaching. The recent remarkable discovery recently of a considerable number of letters and sermons by Augustine has thrown fresh light on the first and last decades of his experience as a bishop. These circumstantial texts have led Peter Brown to reconsider some of his judgments on Augustine, both as the author of the Confessions and as the elderly bishop preaching and writing in the last years of Roman rule in north Africa. Brown's reflections on the significance of these exciting new documents are contained in two chapters of a substantial Epilogue to his biography (the text of which is unaltered). He also reviews the changes in scholarship about Augustine since the 1960s. A personal as well as a scholarly fascination infuse the book-length epilogue and notes that Brown has added to his acclaimed portrait of the bishop of Hippo.
Editorial Reviews
"A model biography. Mr. Brown is an impeccable scholar but also a vivid biographer and a delightful writer; he brings Augustine and his whole age persuasively to life." --Hugh Trevor-Roper, Sunday Times
"I salute Brown's achievement in bringing Augustine out of the tomb of theological doctrine, and setting his mind and emotion working before our eyes." --Richard Southern, New Statesman
About the Author
Peter Brown is Rollins Professor of History at Princeton University. Brown is the leading English-language authority on St. Augustine; his many books include Society and the Holy in Late Antiquity (California, 1982), Body and Society (1988), Power and Persuasion (1992), Authority and the Sacred (1995), and The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, A.D. 200-1000 (1996).
