Confessions

"A major new translation of what is no doubt Augustine's best known and most influential work. There are many good translations of the Confessions, but this is the first one to be carefully sensitive to the philosophical nuances of Augustine's text. The careful yet readable translation is accompanied by an informative and thoughtful Introduction, ample notes, and appendices." -- Paul Vincent Spade, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, Indiana University, Bloomington
"... A model of the translator's art. Williams's Confessions , accurate to the nuance, is as perfect a mirror of Augustine's Latin text as the English language will allow." -- Stanley Lombardo, Professor Emeritus of Classics, University of Kansas
"The best translators of Augustine's Confessions are not rivals of one another, but comrades and co-conspirators. They have a worthy friend in Thomas Williams, whose frank, graceful, wise, thoughtfully annotated English rendering is a brand new revelation of the power and beauty of Augustine's scripturally infused philosophical prose." -- Carol Zaleski, Professor of World Religions, Smith College
"It might be wondered why we need yet another translation of Augustine's Confessions , when so many fine and mellifluous ones already exist. But Thomas Williams supplies a compelling answer in his Introduction to this volume: nowhere else will the philosopher reading Augustine find complete consistency in the translation of key words in Augustine's armoury, vital for understanding his distinctive views about the self and God; and nowhere else is the reader guided so accurately to Augustine's biblical sources, yet with full clarification of the creative freedom with which he uses them. This is a masterly achievement, and will from now on be my own favoured translation for teaching and philosophical reflection." -- Sarah Coakley, University of Cambridge and Australian Catholic University, Melbourne
"Williams is the one I'd hand to an Augustine newcomer. In both its lyrical prose and its excellent, spiritually rich apparatus you can feel Williams's teaching experience. . . . [A] surprisingly necessary new Confessions ." Eve Tushnet, in The University Bookman