" Award-winning journalist Patsy Sims journeyed through the back roads of the South, along the sawdust trail, to take part in the lives of seven American revivalists, their families, crew members, and followers. She attended services conducted by Pentecostal evangelists, with audiences ranging from almost fifty to five thousand. Before, after, and in between she conducted hundred of interviews. What she discovered is a fascinating world dominated by colorful, compelling, unorthodox men who sprang out of a tradition that dates back almost two hundred years. With descriptive, evocative prose, Sims allows readers to vicariously experience old-time religion: a revivalist attempting to raise his son from the dead, a week with an east Tennessee congregation of snakehandlers, the opening-night jitters of a beginning evangelist, and the loneliness of the road for the veterans. Sims's rendering of what goes on in the tents and tabernacles of America allows the people and events to speak for themselves.
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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Throughout the South, the tradition of the Great Revival, almost 200 years old, survives and flourishes in male-dominated evangelism. As Sims (The Klan) concludes from observation of a variety of evangelists and faith healers, there is no clear way to distinguish charlatans from the sincere who purport to be emissaries of the Lord. Instead, she conveys the human elements, the needs that bring "many poor as well as middle-class Protestants who feel lost and estranged in an increasingly complicated world" into the auditoriums and tents of revivalists. With Sims's respectful guidance and nonjudgmental approach, the reader enters a unique, unfamiliar world. Though not as well known as their flamboyant progenitor, Billy Sunday, each of the revivalists interviewed (H. Richard Hall, Mike Shreve, Wayne Simmons et al.), sometimes referred to as "one-man denominations," is shown as a powerful influence on the lives of many Americans. A bibliography on the contemporary revival phenomenon is appended.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Library Journal
Having attended some 50 revivals and taped more than 225 hours of services and interviews in six years, Sims gives an outsider's unbiased look at Southern Pentecostal revivalism. Each of her seven chapters revolves around a particular evangelist, such as R. W. Schambach or Tommy Walker, disclosing one aspect of the phenomenon. Interviews with workers and worshipers as well as evangelists are included, as are eyewitness accounts of snake handlers and attempted resurrections. More important is Sims's feel for the spirit of this type of religion; her peek under the tent flap offers real color and flavor. With a good bibliography. C. Robert Nixon, M.L.S., Lafayette, Ind.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Can somebody shout amen,
This review is from: Can Somebody Shout Amen!: Inside the Tents and Tabernacles of American Revivalists (Religion in the South) (Paperback)
Good book, although I don't think the chapter on snake handling even belongs in this book. I think its the longest chapter, and the least relevant to the title. The last two chapters were the best, and it had a great ending.
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