MURPHY, Cullen 1952–

PERSONAL: Born September 1, 1952, in New Rochelle, NY; son of John Cullen (an artist) and Joan (a homemaker; maiden name, Byrne) Murphy; married Anna Marie Torres (an editor), April 7, 1979; children: John C., Anna, Timothy. Education: Amherst College, B.A., 1974. Religion: Roman Catholic.

ADDRESSES: Office—Atlantic Monthly, 745 N. Washington St., Boston, MA 02114.

CAREER: Wilson Quarterly, Washington, DC, senior editor, 1977–84; Atlantic Monthly, Boston, MA, managing editor, 1984–2005.

WRITINGS:

(With William Rathje) Rubbish!: The Archaeology of Garbage, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 1992.

Just Curious: Essays, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1995.

The Word According to Eve: Women and the Bible in Ancient Times and Our Own, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1999.

Contributor to Harper's and other publications. Writer of comic strip Prince Valiant, drawn by his father, John Murphy.

SIDELIGHTS: Cullen Murphy's The Word According to Eve: Women and the Bible in Ancient Times and Our Own is "one of the finest and most comprehensive introductions to the accomplishments of women in the field of biblical studies," according to a critic for Publishers Weekly. During the past quarter of a century, feminist scholars in particular have begun studying the Bible and publishing revisionist works about its meaning. The book "synthesizes the major points of this new scholarship and sketches informal portraits of the women and men who have created it," Jo Ann Kay McNamara wrote in the New York Times Book Review.

Murphy's account begins with the publication in the 1890s of Elizabeth Cady Stanton's two-volume Woman's Bible, a book deemed by most scholars as the beginning of biblical studies from a female perspective. The rest of the study presents a number of chapters devoted to contemporary women biblical scholars, offering interviews with the subjects along with a discussion of their publications. Murphy points out that women scholars have uncovered a number of apocryphal stories concerning women that were not previously known to academia. Women scholars have also found serious mistranslations. Others have studied how various female figures from the Bible have been represented in art and literature over the centuries. "The book," Carolyn Osiek maintained in Shofar, "is interesting going for the serious reader who is not a scholar in one of the areas discussed." The Word According to Eve, Sara Maitland wrote in Commonweal, "is highly engaging and readable, regardless of your degree of knowledge."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

America, March 6, 1999, review of The Word According to Eve: Women and the Bible in Ancient Times and Our Own, p. 19.

Booklist, October 1, 1998, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 282.

Book World, January 8, 1995, review of Just Curious: Essays, p. 13.

Canadian Geographic, January-February, 1994, Gerald T. Conaty, review of Rubbish!: The Archaeology of Garbage, p. 76.

Choice, May, 1999, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 1635.

Christian Century, April 21, 1999, Dianne Bergant, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 469.

Christianity Today, March 1, 1999, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 60.

Commonweal, November 6, 1998, Sara Maitland, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 24.

ETC: A Review of General Semantics, fall, 1995, D. David Bourland, Jr., review of Just Curious, p. 355.

Kirkus Reviews, November 1, 1994, review of Just Curious, p. 1463.

Library Journal, August, 1998, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 100.

Mediaweek, April 18, 2005, "Atlantic's Murphy Resigns," p. 3.

National Catholic Reporter, February 5, 1999, Pamela Schaeffer, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 24.

New Yorker, September 14, 1998, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 93.

New York Times Book Review, February 26, 1995, review of Just Curious, p. 16; September 6, 1998, Jo Ann Kay McNamara, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 13.

NWSA Journal, summer, 2000, Karla G. Bohmbach, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 193.

Publishers Weekly, November 7, 1994, review of Just Curious, p. 54; July 27, 1998, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 68.

Shofar, winter, 2001, Carolyn Osiek, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 142.

Times Literary Supplement, August 13, 1999, review of The Word According to Eve, p. 31.

Wilson Quarterly, winter, 1995, review of Just Curious, p. 118.

ONLINE

Atlantic Online, http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/ (August 6, 1998), Toby Lester, interview with Cullen Murphy.