New Books in Literary Studies

Can creative writing become a form of biblical interpretation?

That is the provocative question at the heart of my conversation with Sarah Rosenson about her new book, Fan Fiction on the Book of Genesis: A Guide to Close Reading of and Creative Writing on the Bible (Cherry Orchard Books, 2026).

The modern phenomenon of fan fiction involves readers writing
creative pieces that answer questions left open in favorite works of
literature. This also describes the ancient tradition of midrash, where
readers write stories filling in gaps in the Bible. In Fan Fiction on the Book of Genesis
Sarah Rosenson discusses the questions left open in the first book of
the Bible, and every chapter includes questions for the characters in
the stories, which can serve as prompts for conversations or creative
writing.

Rosenson argues that careful reading reveals narrative gaps:
characters whose motivations remain unexplained, conversations that
never occur, ethical dilemmas left unresolved, and emotions that are
only implied. Drawing on the long tradition of Jewish midrash, she
proposes that readers can engage these silences through disciplined
creative writing, using imagination not as a substitute for close
reading but as an extension of it.

In our conversation, we
discussed some of Genesis's most familiar stories from unexpected
angles. What if Eve's pursuit of knowledge is more complex than simple
disobedience? Why does Noah never challenge God's decision to destroy
the world? What happens when Hagar's perspective becomes central rather
than peripheral? Why does Abraham argue for the people of Sodom but
remain silent when Isaac is placed on the altar? And how does the Joseph
narrative negotiate the relationship between divine providence and
human responsibility?

We also explore the broader methodological
questions raised by the book. Does describing midrash as "fan fiction"
make an ancient interpretive tradition more accessible, or does it risk
misunderstanding it? How far can readers imaginatively expand biblical
narratives while remaining faithful to the text? And what safeguards
distinguish responsible interpretation from speculation?

Whether
you are interested in biblical studies, literary criticism, Jewish
interpretation, or creative writing, our conversation offers a
thoughtful discussion of how ancient texts continue to invite new
readings. More than providing answers, Rosenson's book encourages
readers to ask better questions and, in doing so, to discover that
Genesis remains as intellectually and ethically challenging today as it
has been for centuries.

You can find more about Sarah and her work here.

Amisah Bakuri (PhD) is
an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities
at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. Her work explores the intersections of
religion, sexuality, gender, and migration, especially within African
diasporic communities in the Netherlands.
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Today’s guest, Krzysztof Rowiński, is the author of Failure Narratives Beyond Redemption: Twentieth Century Literature and Film
(Routledge, 2026). This book focuses on the concept of non- redemptive
failure, a type of failure that is not part of a larger narrative of
success or narrative redemption, with attention to how the concept
functions between literature, critical theory, and other fields.
Examining literature and film from mid- twentieth- century Poland,
Italy, and the United States, it traces productive effects of failure
which cannot survive into the future, yet have an important,
transformative impact in the moment in which they occur. The book
engages with the work of John Williams, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and Bruno
Jasieński, proposing a theory of failure at the intersection of literary
study, performance theory, and political thought. In discussing these
examples, the book examines the place of failure in the broader context
of modern and contemporary US American, Italian, and Polish literary and
cultural traditions.

Because of its interdisciplinary potential, this study might appeal
to readers in art history, philosophy, political theory, and other
fields within the humanities and social sciences. Failure Narratives Beyond Redemption
offers a framework that could not only spotlight the contribution of
literary studies to the topic, in the form of narrative analysis but
also become part of the theoretical apparatus for further research in
these fields.

Jane Hwang Degenhardt is Professor English at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is the author of Globalizing Fortune on the Early Modern Stage (Oxford UP, 2022) and Islamic Conversion and Christian Resistance on the Early Modern Stage (Edinburgh UP, 2012). She is also a co-editor of the academic journal English Literary Renaissance.
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Exemplarity and Allusion in Macrobius' Saturnalia (Oxford UP, 2026) offers a new framework for interpreting interactions with classical source material in Macrobius’ Saturnalia. It argues that the Saturnalia, an educational dialogue from the fifth century ce, does not view its Greco-Roman models as hegemonic sources of authority but engages with these texts in dynamic and critical ways. In particular, Macrobius responds to both the literary and ethical agendas of his predecessors, a strategy which is termed ethical allusion. The book explores this intertwining of moral, social, and aesthetic commentary in the Saturnalia’s allusions to authors such as Aulus Gellius, Cicero, Plato, Plutarch, and Virgil. It also examines Macrobius’ ethical allusions alongside the aesthetic practices and moral thought of the late fourth and the fifth centuries, and sheds light on the Saturnalia’s role in pioneering a late antique intellectual culture at once less hierarchical and less engaged with civic life.

New Books in Late Antiquity is presented by Ancient Jew Review.

Katherine Krauss is Assistant Teaching Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies at Penn State.

Michael Motia teaches in Classics and Religious Studies at UMass Boston
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With The Art of Living in Avant-Garde Paris: Ethics and Self-Making in Dada, Simultanism, and Surrealism (University of Chicago Press, 2026),
Rachel Silveri takes a fresh look at the desire to unify art and life,
an ambition long regarded as foundational to the European historical
avant-gardes. She reveals how many early twentieth-century artists saw
their own everyday lives—their bodies, identities, and relationships—as a
type of creative material and a central component
to their avant-garde practice. These artists abandoned traditional
forms of artmaking and venues of art viewing, instead aspiring to
integrate art with everyday life, creating an “art of living.” 

Considering
Tristan Tzara’s performances of Dadaist identity, Sonia Delaunay’s
simultaneous fashions and self-branding, and the collective endeavor to
open and operate the Surrealist Research Bureau, Silveri offers a new
narrative about how the artists of interwar Paris developed experiential
life practices that resisted dominant forms of “lifestyle” and
normative discourses surrounding gender, ethnicity, and office work.
This book argues that ethical questions of “How should I live?” and “How
should I relate to others?” were as important to the avant-garde as
politics, and that aspirations to change the world played out in daily
practices of self-making.

Hannah Freed-Thall is Professor of French Literature, Thought and Culture at NYU. She is the author, most recently, of Modernism at the Beach: Queer Ecologies and the Coastal Commons.
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Kevin P. Reilly is President Emeritus and Regent Professor with the University of Wisconsin System, having served as President from 2004-13. Kevin grew up in Manhattan and the Bronx, and went on to earn his B.A. at the University of Notre Dame, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota, all in English. He has published on higher education policy and accreditation, autobiography and biography, and in Irish Studies.

In this interview he discusses his most recent book, Gregory Ghosts: Haunting Irishness (Peter Lang, 2026), a creative non-fiction intervention into Irish literary studies.

This book is a kind of Irish ghost story. In it the ghosts of Lady Augusta Gregory (1852-1932) and eight of her family members and colleagues look back over their lives—and sometimes forward beyond them—to try to make sense of them, their times, and one another. Theirs were all turbulent lives played out on the western edge of Europe at a time of great change.Lady Gregory helped shape that change at a pivotal moment in Ireland’s development into a modern nation state. The author’s fresh approach questions and complicates the image of her as a prim Victorian workhorse. Setting her in the midst of the personal chatter of her departed family, lovers, friends, and collaborators brings home how the historical Irish moment found her just when it needed her.

Gregory Ghosts: Haunting Irishness is published with Peter Lang, as part of their Re-imagining Ireland series

Aidan Beatty is a lecturer in the history department at Carnegie Mellon University and the President of the American Conference for Irish Studies

Transcript here
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