I have been revisiting Rhoad’s and Michie’s insightful, Mark as Story. Here is one of the helpful insights from the book.
"When the narrator is omniscient and invisible, readers tend to be unaware of the narrator’s biases, values, and conceptual view of the world. The reader tends to trust the narrator as a disinterested observer of the events of the story. But the omniscient narrator is not a disinterested observer. Rather, the narrator functions as would the director of a movie., as someone who is responsible for the presentation of the whole story. Viewers observe the scenes and characters from the director’s perspective, although they never see the director. Similarly, the narrator of a story in literature is responsible for not just the asides but for the presentation of the whole story. The narrator narrates the story with certain loaded words, in a certain order, and with various rhetorical techniques. So the narrator is always there at the reader’s elbow shaping responses to the story—even, and perhaps especially, when the reader is least aware of it."
David Rhoads and Donald Michie, Mark as Story: An Introduction to the Narrative of a Gospel (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1982), 39.
The latest issue of Review of Biblical Literature is out. Reviews can be accessed by clicking the links below but unfortunately you must be a SBL member to read them.
Michaela Bauks and Saul M. Olyan, eds., Pain in Biblical Texts and Other Materials of the Ancient Mediterranean (Mohr Siebeck)
Laura M. Zucconi
William Lane Craig, In Quest of the Historical Adam (Eerdmans)
Dexter Callender
Edward Feld, The Book of Revolutions: The Battles of Priests, Prophets, and Kings That Birthed the Torah (Jewish Publication Society)
Lester L. Grabbe
Tobias Nicklas, Janet E. Spittler, and Jan N. Bremmer, eds., The Apostles Peter, Paul, John, Thomas and Philip with Their Companions in Late Antiquity (Peeters)
Jeremy Wade Barrier
Jason M. Silverman, Persian Royal-Judaean Elite Engagements in the Early Teispid and Achaemenid Empire: The King’s Acolytes (T&T Clark)
Kenneth Ristau
Jan R. Stenger, Johannes Chrysostomos und die Christianisierung der Polis: “Damit die Städte Städte werden” (Mohr Siebeck)
Chris L. de Wet
Joseph Verheyden and Tobias Nicklas, eds., Early Christian Commentators of the New Testament: Essays on Their Aims, Methods and Strategies (Peeters)
Gerald Bray
Karolien Vermeulen and Elizabeth R. Hayes, How We Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture’s Style and Meaning (Eerdmans)
Anna E. Marsh
