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Terryl L. Givens

Terryl L. Givens is a Fellow at the Wheatley Institution. Prior to joining the Maxwell Institute at Brigham Young University as Senior Fellow, Givens taught literature at the University of Richmond. Givens completed his graduate work at Cornell University in Intellectual History and received his Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from UNC Chapel Hill. As a commentator on Mormon religion and culture, he has appeared on PBS, NPR, and CNN. He has published in literary theory, British and Europe Romanticism, Mormon studies, and intellectual history. He has authored and co-authored many books including “By the Hand of Mormon: The American Scripture that Launched a New World Religion”, which the New York Times called “provocative reading”; “People of Paradox: A History of Mormon Culture”, which was named Best Book of the Year by the Mormon History Association for 2007; “When Souls had Wings: Premortal Life in Western Thought”; and “Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism”, co-authored with Matthew Grow. He recently co-authored “The God Who Weeps” with his wife Fiona and is currently at work on a two-volume history of Mormon theology, for Oxford University Press.