Mleynek (English and women's studies, U. of Hawaii-Hilo) takes the Biblical garden as the locus for anagnorisis , by which Aristotle means the transformation from ignorance to knowledge, to establish the connection between knowledge and mortality. Then she finds the same motif in three 19th-century British novels and in the postmodern novel Possession . She concludes that the motif transcends genre and period because the knowledge of mortality is humanity's most ontologically disturbing burden. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
