Among the Mormons: A Selected Bibliography of Recent Books on Mormons and Mormonism

Scholarly as well as popular interest in Mormonism continues at an almost unprecedented rate. The Saints remain, as they always have, a peculiar people. Their history, as Winfred E. Garrison aptly observed, “bristles” with controversial issues that make it one of the “most interesting strands of American history.” During the past century and a half they have survived fierce opposition and surmounted tremendous obstacles. 

Early in their history Mormons were driven from state to state in search of an area in which they might worship in peace. Yet, as C. LeRoy Anderson dramatically points out in his recent study, For Christ Will Come Tomorrow: The Saga of the Morrisites, they have had little sympathy for those who left their movement and sought answers elsewhere. 

Another milestone in candor is D. Michael Quinn’s J. Reuben Clark: The Church Years, which covers the sensitive and important problems that con fronted the Church as it sought to become a world-wide denomination. Gary L. Bunker and Davis Bitton, in capturing The Mormon Graphic Image, 1834- 1914, have helped us to understand better why Saints once had horns. 

Although Harold Schindler’s newly revised edition of his classic biography of Orrin Porter Rockwell: Man of God, Son of Thunder has received mixed reviews, his exhaustive research and journalistic style still make it an attractive study. Destined also to have a significant impact on how Mormonism is viewed in the future are Conway B. Sonne’s Saints on the Seas: A Maritime History of 

Mormon Migration, Donald O. Cannon’s Far West Record: Minutes of the Church 1830-1844, and Wilford Woodruff’s Journal, a multi-volume type script, handsomely bound, and prepared by Scott Kenney. 

Then there is Dean C. Jessee’s compilation, The Writings of Joseph Smith. For Jessee, who has devoted his entire career to establishing the integrity of these documents, it marks yet another major contribution to his already distinguished work.