Do The Gods Wear Capes?: Spirituality, Fantasy, and Superheroes (New Directions in Religion and Literature)

I expected an inaccessible scholarly read, but what I received was a book I couldn't put down, enlightening, entertaining, and challenging. I'm not an academic. This book was written for us all, scholars and just Plain Janes like me.I have loved the comic book heroes since I was a child. I admired and envied their superhuman ways of being in the world, yet at the same time so wonderfully flawed emotionally. That was part of their appeal for me. That made them much more real and identifiable, beings I could relate to.Growing up in an emotionally unhealthy home (who didn't?) they helped me escape from reality and dream and imagine. It was harmless and saved me from feeling sorry for myself because I had a way to escape as well, just as they did.I also was taught in some ways by these same superheroes in ways the originators may or may not have imagined they would influence their readership, yet Saunders recognizes this and articulates it beautifully numerous times and in just one example as follows:"To take the ethical choice is therefore to commit to a lifelong project; it is not a once-and-for-all decision to 'do the right thing' so much as an endless process of self-examination and self-correction."It's those kind of sentences that took me to another level of understanding and truly let this 60-year-old woman off the hook and can stop feeling guilty for loving the superheroes, still loving them.I was constantly surprised by Saunders' insights and every time he expanded a new understanding for me, I felt that wonderful insight rise to the surface, and say yes, yes, that's right. That's exactly right.Thank you, Professor Saunders, for writing this most enjoyable and erudite book about a subject I've loved most of my life, but which is derided as trite way too often.Janice Friend

The antithesis of shallow fanboy pandering, Saunders' DO THE GODS WEAR CAPES? is a thoughtful, well-reasoned, ultimately satisfying exploration of a surprisingly neglected theme suffusing many superhero comics - spirituality. Applying a chapter-by-chapter analysis of the oft-overlooked moral & ethical aspects of four iconic characters - Superman, Wonder Woman, Spider Man, and Iron Man - Saunders uncovers surprising links between these well-known superhumans and such all-too-ordinary concerns as the terror of vulnerability, the burden of guilt, and the difficulty of love. Potential readers who might be wary of GODS academic tone and at times complex philosophical/theological ruminations are encouraged to leave their doubts at the door - this is an elegantly-described, deeply felt, fascinating journey. One that references everything from the notion that 1973's AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #121 (wherein Peter Parker accidentally killed girlfriend Gwen Stacey while trying to save her) marked the end of "the joyful...so-called Silver Age (of comics) to the more uncertain, pessimistic and cynical Bronze Age," to the theory that a sequence in the first IRON MAN film (wherein Gwyneth Paltrow manually replaces Robert Downey Jr.'s chest-based power unit) can also be read as a near-hardcore sex scene! Obviously the result of a life-long fan who both respects and understands the medium, DO THE GODS WEAR CAPES? is an important work that belongs on the bookshelf - digital or actual - of any serious comic book aficionado.

This book is truly amazing. It breaks down incredibly complex ideas and belief structures into relatively absorbable (given the scope) mind blowing epiphany nuggets. It's the kind of book you don't get too far into without making a list of the other people you will want to share it with.Just a warning: The introduction sets up a pretty staggering learning curve, but once you're over that, the rest is incredibly compelling, insightful and as much fun as hard intellectual work (about comics) ever gets.

I have been a collector since 1991. Since purchasing this book, I have been able to 'talk the talk' with people who love comics. This book gave me a better understanding of the nucleus of comic books. Since my first reading, I have had a better appreciation of the origins of comic books.

This is an excellent scholarly work on the whole superhero creation. If you're looking for a comic book style of writing , this is not it -- if you're looking for some really good writing and research, this is your book.

Sonntag's review notwithstanding, Saunders' book is not a ripoff of Knowles' book. The methodologies of the two books are very different. Saunders engages in long, careful readings of particular characters, and engages the material on a different level than Knowles. His approach is not "speculative" but exploratory; in other words, he isn't try to draw speculative historical connections. Instead, he's trying to READ the comics carefully, through the lens of contemporary theology as well as contemporary literary and cultural theory. In the process he does some startling and VERY interesting work.So, don't judge this illuminating and useful book by Sonntag's comments. He appears not to have read Saunders carefully. DO THE GODS WEAR CAPES? is an important addition to the critical conversation about superheroes and one of the few rock-solid, well-constructed scholarly books on the genre. It's also quite well written: Saunders has an accessible, trenchant style that lifts his work well beyond that of many treatises on the genre.If you're intrigued by scholarly discussions of comics, superheroes, popular culture, and/or spirituality, you'll find the book very rewarding. I consider it a must-have for those wanting to do in-depth critical work on superheroes. In the future I'll definitely be using it in my writing and teaching.

I really enjoyed this. I would have loved books like this to give to my comic loving family members. Who would have thought so many challenging ideas could be expressed from and about comics.This is the way to attract people to 'thinking' using popular culture.

Seriously it goes really into three different subjects such as the redemption and the loss of spiderman and also wonderwoman and how she's been created and the ideas into her it's all pretty cool.

After reading several books on the superheroes, I found this reading really unique and not inclined on a simple deconstruction of the latex heroes, but their construction, a research that does not go to investigate just the similarities in past myths, belittling heroes, instead finds a way to make them more profound both to inexperienced eyes and professionals, looking at their strengths and their flaws with not a critical approach, but purely philosophical, almost religious.