Skip to main content
PBS logo
 
 

Book Review of The Source

The Source
The Source
Author: James A. Michener
Genre: Literature & Fiction
Book Type: Paperback
buzzby avatar reviewed on + 6062 more book reviews


Written in 1965, I read it soon after, and if you had asked me, I would have said it was the best book ever written. I re-read parts of it now, and I'll still stick with my opinion, but it does seem kind of dated and 50s-style shallow today, with characters saying such cheery things like "Just like the Jews, denied religious liberty by all, they extend it to everyone." A lot of my attitudes towards that region, archeology and the ancient and medieval world were formed by this book, and I still think you can get more knowledge from it than most history books, but, my gosh, it's still a novel. Michener apparently was 300 years off on the date that the gospels were written (he has them being written in the 300s, it is now universally accepted that they were written 60AD-100AD), I don't know whether that is because of outdated scholarship or what.