The devil's mousetrap
Subtitle: redemption and colonial American literature
By: Linda Munk.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 1997
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 144
Subjects: Edwards, Jonathan, 1703-1758 -- Criticism and interpretation.; Taylor, Edward, 1642-1729 -- Criticism and interpretation.; Mather, Increase, 1639-1723 -- Literary art.; American literature -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775 -- History and criticism.; Christian literature, American -- Puritan authors -- History and criticism.; American literature -- New England -- History and criticism.; Puritan movements in literature.; Redemption in literature.; Puritans in literature.
Description: This study approaches the thought of three colonial New England divines - Increase Mather, Jonathan Edwards, and Edward Taylor - from the perspective of literary criticism. Author Linda Munk focuses on the background of these men's ideas and the sources from which they drew, directly and indirectly, in framing their theology.

She notes that the language used in the pulpit by Mather, Edwards, and Taylor is full of allusions to the Bible and the Apocrypha, to Puritan treatises, and, most remarkably, to post-biblical exegesis, Jewish and Christian. She proceeds to unpack these allusions that have, for the most part, proven to be unclear to contemporary readers, in order to provide essential insights into the construction of Puritan theology.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.