Augustine

'Give me chastity, but not yet', young Augustine famously prayed to God. From his time as a sexual sinner and member of an outlawed heretical sect to his eventual conversion to Christianity, his masterpiece the Confessions is a classic study of anguish, hesitation and what he believes to be God's intervention. It has inspired philosophers, Christian thinkers and monastic followers, but it still leaves readers wondering why exactly Augustine chose to compose a work like none before it.

In this book, Robin Lane Fox follows him on a brilliantly-described journey through his various conversions and their sequels. He combines the latest scholarship with recently-found letters and sermons by Augustine himself to give a portrait of his subject which is subtly different from older biographies. Anyone with an interest in pagans and Christians, in Christian biography and responses to the Bible will be fascinated by the range of young Augustine's mind and the context in which this exceptional book puts him.