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Although autobiographical narrative makes up much of the first 9 of the 13 books of Augustine’s Confessiones (c. 400; Confessions), autobiography is incidental to the main purpose of the work. For Augustine, “confessions” is a catchall term for acts of religiously authorized speech: praise of God, blame of self, confession of faith. The book is a richly textured meditation by a middle-aged man (Augustine was in his early 40s when he wrote it) on the course and meaning of his own life. The dichotomy between past odyssey and present position of authority as bishop is emphasized in numerous ways in ...(100 of 5915 words)