Books: Black Bible

GILES GOAT-BOY by John Barth. 710 pages. Doubleday. $6.95.

John Barth, college English teacher and a leading comic of the theater of black humor, now makes with his academic robes like Mephistopheles—or perhaps Batman. Out tumbles a gothic fun-house fantasy of theology, sociology and sex, leaping across great tracts of human history. Fascism, Communism, recent wars, revolutions and the East-West split are played back in surrealist style. Practically every philosophy is put in the pillory. Barth contrives to blaspheme against, and maybe illuminate, both Judaism and Christianity, as well as the central tenet...

Want the full story?

Subscribe Now

Subscribe
Subscribe

Learn more about the benefits of being a TIME subscriber

If you are already a subscriber sign up — registration is free!