Papers from Hillsdale College
REL 319 -- Eighteenth Century Theology:
Jonathan Edwards and American Puritanism
Cotton Mather: An Annotated Bibliography
by Darla Burl and Bethany Newton
Lattimore, Richard. The Iliad of Homer . University Press: Chicago 1951.
This is a modern-verse translation of the great Greek classic telling the story of the fall of Troy as it happened according to the will of the gods.
Levin, David. " Trying to Make a Monster Human: judgment in the biography of Cotton Mather". The Yale Review. v.73, Winter `84, Pg. 210-29.
David Levin writes an article responding to the way literary critics reacted to his book entitled Cotton Mather: The Young Life of the Lord's Remembrance. He suggests he did not take a favoring or disfavoring view of Cotton Mather and neither did he sympathize with him as so many of Mather's modern biographers. He simply reiterates on the point he made in his book that Cotton Mather had big shoes to fill with the ministerial ancestry he was a part of.
Levin, David. Cotton Mather: The Young Life of the Lord's Remembrance. Harvard University Press: Cambridge 1978.
Levin writes on the first forty years of Cotton Mather's life focusing on his ministry, religious experiences, and his love for the New England people. Levin also places certain concentration on Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana, more so than any other of his works. Levin is sure to incluse all significant historical events which occur around the times he focuses on in Mather's life and his involvement in them.
Marvin, Rev. Abijah P. The Life and Times of Cotton Mather, D.D., F.R.S. Congregational Sunday School and Publishing Co.: 1892.
The Reverend Abijah P. Marvin writes an entire detailed history on the life of Cotton Mather from his birth to his death. He includes family background and history, details on Mather's years at Harvard, medical pursuits, witchcraft trials and scandals, curch formations and political involvement. Much is also written about Mather's three wives and his children.
Mather, Cotton. The Diary of Cotton Mather. Vol.I, II Frederick Ungar Pub. Co.: New York.
This is the diary of Cotton Mather collected into a two volume set. The collection includes entries he wrote beginning in 1681 at the age of 17. These diaries continue through the year 1724, four years priort to his death. The last four years of his life are not known about as much because of this. Volume one includes a page which lists where original sections of Mather's diary can be found in libraries across the United States.
Silverman, Kenneth. The Life and Times of Cotton Mather. Harper and Row Pub.: New York 1984.
Silverman's biography portrays Cotton Mather's life rather sympathetically. He includes a detailed history on Cotton's life, but a lot of the focus falls on down times in his life. For example, an entire chapter is devoted to the devastation that fell upon Cotton as his wife, three of his children, and the maid-servant died. Unlike other biograpthers of Mather, Silverman's account of Cotton Mather's death seems pathetic and viewed sympathetically.
Stout, Harry S. The New England Soul. Oxford University Press: Oxford, New York 1986
Wendell, Barrett. Cotton Mather: The Puritan Priest . Harbinger Pub.: New York.
Wendell writes about Cotton Mather in his biography as a devout Puritan minister who lived a good life and who was respected by his family and members in his community. Wendell concludes his interpretation on the life of Mather by ending with the lines which say it was " a good man they buried on Copp's Hill one February day in the year 1728." Portayal of Cotton in this biography is positive and much of the focus is on his ministerial life.
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Last updated: 19 March 1998