Issue 5

Contributors

Ron Hansen wrote the novel Mariette in Ecstasy , which became a surprise best-seller in 1993. As his essay in this issue explains, he has written two other critically acclaimed novels: Desperadoes and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford . His short-story collection Nebraska received an Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters.

Paul Mariani has published four books of poetry, the most recent being Salvage Operations . He has also written biographies of twentieth century American poets William Carlos Williams and John Berryman. A third biography, Lost Puritan: a Life of Robert Lowell , will be published by Norton in September. Mr. Mariani is Distinguished University Professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

C.H. Sisson is one of the leading poets of Great Britain. His books include The London Zoo (1961), Numbers (1965), Metamorphoses (1968), In the Trojan Ditch (1974), Anchises (1976), Exactions (1980), and Collected Poems 1943-1983 .

Harold Fickett has recently published First Light , the first in a series of historical novels published by Bethany House. He is executive director of the Milton Center at Kansas Newman College, a center for excellence in imaginative writing by Christians. His previous books include the novel Holy Fool and a critical biography, Flannery O'Connor: Images of Grace . He serves as executive editor of Image .

Virginia Stem Owens is the director of the Milton Center at Kansas Newman College, Wichita. Her latest book, A Multitude of Sins , completed a trilogy of suspense novels. She serves as a senior editor of Image .

Eugene H. Peterson is professor of spiritual theology at Regent College in Vancouver, Canada. He has written twenty books, including A Long Obedience in the Same Direction , The Message (a translation of the New Testament into contemporary English) and The Message Psalms (from which the Psalms in this issue were garnered).

Ronald Austin is a writer and producer in Hollywood. He has written media criticism for the New Oxford Review , the National Catholic Register , and Catholic World Report .

Scott Cairns has published three books of poetry: Figures for the Ghost (University of Georgia Press), The Translation of Babel (University of Georgia Press), and The Theology of Doubt (Cleveland State University Poetry Center). He co-directs the creative writing program at the University of North Texas, Denton.

John Mason Hodges is music director of the Germantown Symphony Orchestra located in greater Memphis, Tennessee. He is also artistic director of Ars Nova, Inc., a multifaceted organization in which he produces lectures and concerts with a chamber orchestra, edits a quarterly publication ( Crossroads ) on Christianity and the arts, and leads the Memphis Arts Group, a fellowship of Christians called to artistic professions. He studied conducting under Leonard Bernstein, and is currently writing a book on the subject of aesthetics.

Erin McGraw has published short stories in the Atlantic , the Kenyon Review , the Georgia Review , Crazyhorse , and other journals. Her first collection of short stories, Bodies at Sea , was published in 1989 by University of Illinois Press. She is now completing a second collection, tentatively entitled Lies of the Saints .

Marjorie Maddox has published work in more than 130 journals, including Poetry , Prairie Schooner, and the Wisconsin Review . An assistant professor of literature and writing at Lock Haven University in Lock Haven, Pennsylvania, she won an Academy of American Poets Prize in 1989. Her chapbook, How to Fit God into a Poem, just won Painted Bride Quarterly 's national chapbook contest.

Richard Wilkinson is managing editor of Image . He has worked as a book and magazine writer for more than a decade.