Name: Reading Group: Harry Stout’s The Divine Dramatist
Start: 2025-10-16T19:00:00-05:00
Location: 365 East Campus Mall, Suite 200, Madison, WI, United States, Wisconsin 53715

$Reading Group: Harry Stout\u2019s The Divine Dramatist$

What is American evangelical Christianity? Join John Fea, historian and Lumen Center Visiting Fellow, for a five-week seminar on Harry S. Stout’s classic 1991 book, The Divine Dramatist: George Whitefield and the Rise of Modern Evangelicalism. We’ll explore the 18th-century roots of evangelical Christianity, the history of religious revivalism (the so-called “First Great Awakening”), and the connections between evangelical faith and national identity through the life of America’s first religious celebrity: George Whitefield.
As part of our ongoing practice of reading modern classics, this group invites thoughtful conversation about Stout’s accessible and insightful work. Participants will read a few chapters each week, with optional readings available for those who wish to dig deeper into the material.
Thursdays | Oct 16 – Nov 13 | 6:00–7:30 p.m.
Upper House | Free to attend (please purchase your own copy of The Divine Dramatist)
Used copies are widely available online. This is a small-group gathering. Register and read early, and come ready to reflect together.
John Fea is Visiting Distinguished Fellow at the Lumen Center, Professor of American History, and the Chair of the History Department at Messiah University. His writings have appeared in various scholarly and popular venues, and he is the founder and author of the popular long-running blog “The Way of Improvement Leads Home.” His books include Why Study History?: Reflecting on the Importance of the Past, Second Edition (Baker Academic, 2024) and Was America Founded as a Christian Nation: A Historical Introduction (Westminster/ John Knox Press, 2011).