The Universal Father: A Life of John Paul II

by Garry O'Connor

Overview

Pope John Paul II is universally considered one of the great leaders of the twentieth century for his resolute resistance to Soviet Communism, for his steadfast opposition to war, and for opening up the papacy to ordinary people. He will go down in history not only as the third longest-serving pope, but possibly the most politically influential of all 305 popes and antipopes since St. Peter.
Born in Poland in 1920, Karol Wojtyla's early life experiences were of intense love and intense loss: he was eight when his mother died, twelve when his older brother died of scarlet fever, and twenty when his severe but loving father died during the Nazi occupation. An athlete, a gifted poet, playwright and actor, by 1944, after a near fatal accident, Wojtyla was studying for the priesthood in secret. So began a lifelong quest to understand good and evil in the human heart.
Five years in the making, Universal Father is a vivid and scrupulously researched portrait of this extraordinary man. Beginning with Wojtyla's trying childhood and his early years as a priest in rural Poland, and continuing on to his travels to Rome, and his subsequent papal reign, O'Connor's biography is unparalleled for the attention it also gives to the inner man-including a subtle analysis of the pope's own poems, plays, and philosophical works. An exploration of both the personal tragedies in the pope's life, among them the assassination attempt in 1981, and the public triumphs, such as the great public confrontations with Soviet Communism in his native Poland, Universal Father is a revealing and profoundly moving testament.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781596918696
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date:	12/12/2008
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	448
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Garry O'Connor has been a major and prolific English biographer since his life of Ralph Richardson, published in 1980, was hailed in The New York Times Book Review as "Stunning... the best biography of an actor I've ever read," and by the London Sunday Times as an "astounding book, original in form and fascinating in content." He has subsequently written highly praised lives of Sean O'Casey, Peggy Ashcroft, Paul Scofield and William Shakespeare and, most recently, Alec Guinness. He lives in England with his wife and six children.

Table of Contents

	List of Illustrations and Picture Credits	ix
	Maps	xi
	Preface	1
Part 1	A Slav Troubadour in Troubled Times (1920-46)
1	Like Death, Beyond Comprehension	5
2	I Became a Motherless Only Child	15
3	When the Ship Is Sinking, What Is Private?	25
4	Vita Cracoviensis	46
5	The Year of Three Plays	56
6	Equilibrium Which Love Learns Through Anger	65
7	The Actor Carries the Problem	75
8	Hidden Forces Produce the Strongest Actions	88
9	The Black Hood Went over His Head	102
Part 2	The Hidden Breath of the Spirit Will Unify All (1946-78)
10	Living in Little More than a Hut	109
11	My train to Krakow Isn't until after Midnight	124
12	Sexual Drive Is a Gift from God	140
13	The Tangle of Bushes and Shoots	154
14	Was this Goodbye to the Inner Man?	162
15	Death, the Place of Greatest Concentration	174
Part 3	The Pope of this Distracted Globe (1978-90)
16	Peter, You Are the Floor	197
17	He's cleaned up His Plate	208
18	Other Points of the Compass	224
19	Opening the Ways of the Spirit	233
20	Be Sober, Be Watchful	242
21	Siege or Sanctuary?	256
22	The Ravelled Sleeve of Christianity	264
23	What Do They Think I Said Next?	278
24	Now for the Polish Endgame	281
Part 4	The Nearer we Are to the Mountain, the Smaller we Are (1990-2005)
25	Was He Losing the Plot?	303
26	The Connection with Suffering	314
27	Still Seeking to Heal	319
28	True Protagonist of the Story	332
29	The Outward Husk of Mortality	341
30	Final Lighting of the Lamp	347
	Epilogue	354
	Notes	359
	Chronology	393
	Documents of John Paul II	403
	Select bibliography	411
	Acknowledgements	423
	Index	425

Recipe

UNIVERSAL FATHER: A Life of John Paul II

Pope John Paul II is universally considered one of the great leaders of the twentieth century for his resolute resistance to Soviet Communism, for his steadfast opposition to war, and for opening up the papacy to ordinary people. He will go down in history not only as the third longest-serving pope, but possibly the most politically influential of all 305 popes and antipopes since St. Peter.

Born in Poland in 1920, Karol Wojtyla’s early life experiences were of intense love and intense loss: he was eight when his mother died, twelve when his older brother died of scarlet fever, and twenty when his severe but loving father died during the Nazi occupation. An athlete, a gifted poet, playwright and actor, by 1944, after a near fatal accident, Wojtyla was studying for the priesthood in secret. So began a lifelong quest to understand good and evil in the human heart.

Five years in the making, Universal Father is a vivid and scrupulously researched portrait of this extraordinary man. Beginning with Wojtyla’s trying childhood and his early years as a priest in rural Poland, and continuing on to his travels to Rome, and his subsequent papal reign, O’Connor’s biography is unparalleled for the attention it also gives to the inner man—including a subtle analysis of the pope’s own poems, plays, and philosophical works. An exploration of both the personal tragedies in the pope’s life, among them the assassination attempt in 1981, and the public triumphs, such as the great public confrontations with Soviet Communism in his native Poland, Universal Father is arevealing and profoundly moving testament.

Editorial Reviews

Though dozens of authoritative titles about one of the world's most recognized men exist on bookshelves across the globe, this addition has unique merit. O'Connor (William Shakespeare: A Popular Life), an accomplished biographer and a well-connected Vatican insider, bases his insightfully written and thoroughly researched text on scholarly sources and interviews heretofore not articulated in the popular press. The text is divided into four distinct phases of Pope John Paul II's life: "1920-1946," "1946- 1978," "1978-1990," and "1990- 2005." Each phase balances fact with anecdotal evidence, which lends the biography both credibility and charm. That this biography was written before the Pope's death in April 2005 does not detract from its comprehensiveness. In addition to various details about and insights into the Pope's life, O'Connor includes more than 30 pages of notes, a chronology of the Pope, and documents he authored. This timely and remarkable biography will be sought after by serious readers. Recommended for all libraries collecting material on Catholicism or contemporary biography.-John-Leonard Berg, Univ. of Wisconsin Lib., Platteville Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

"A warm, humane, and lively portrait, fresh and original in its depiction of the pope."

New York Sun