Fisher, Vardis
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
(1895-1968) US author, raised in a Mormon family; his best-known single novel, Children of God (1939), is about the Mormons. His Testament of Man sequence covers the whole of human history, extending into many volumes the basic strategy which shapes several novels by F Britten Austin, the six volumes of Johannes V Jensen's The Long Journey (1922-1924) and other early-twentieth-century celebrations of the drama of Evolution. Of sf interest in the Testament are the first five titles, which are Prehistoric SF: Darkness and the Deep (1943), which focuses on pre-human cultures, The Golden Rooms (1944), Intimations of Eve (1946), Adam and the Serpent (1947) and The Divine Passion (1948), the last two of which concentrate on the gradual shift from a matriarchal world to the patriarchy which (he argues in later volumes of the sequence) continues to distort the human enterprise. In these later volumes – especially Jesus Came Again (1956) – Fisher presents the history of humanity from an explicitly atheist perspective, which generated acrimony in America. [JC]
see also: Adam and Eve; Origin of Man.
Vardis Alvero Fisher
born Annis, Idaho: 31 March 1895
died Hagerman, Idaho: 9 July 1968
works
series
Testament of Man (first five titles only)
- Darkness and the Deep (New York: The Vanguard Press, 1943) [Testament of Man: hb/]
- The Golden Rooms (New York: The Vanguard Press, 1944) [Testament of Man: hb/]
- Intimations of Eve (New York: The Vanguard Press, 1946) [Testament of Man: hb/]
- Adam and the Serpent (New York: The Vanguard Press, 1947) [Testament of Man: hb/]
- The Divine Passion (New York: Vanguard Press, 1948) [Testament of Man: hb/]
links
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