AustLit

Debates on the relation between culture and the Bible are locked into two restrictive models: either the Bible is a source for subsequent appropriations, or it is the goal that one must attain through the thicket of those appropriations. In order to trouble this two-way street, I explore the words and music of Nick Cave, focusing on the way he controls interpretation of his work and where that control breaks down. At this moment Cave provides an unwitting insight into another way to view the relation of the Bible and culture, one that operates in terms of "strategies of containment"' (Author's abstract)