8 February 2018Times Higher Education 53BOOKS
OWhat sorts of books inspired
you as a child?
As a child, I loved mystery and
detective novels – Nancy Drew
stories. I relish a good quest,
a puzzle.OWhich books first piqued your
interest in archaeology – and in
particular the archaeology of the
New Testament?
My interest in material culture
was piqued after reading Geza
Vermes’ bookJesus the Jew
when I was 22. I found it on
the shelves of the Penguin
Bookshop in London’s Covent
Garden when I was working
there in retail, as a Kiwi abroad,
before I began studying the
ancient world. Vermes did not
particularly look at material
culture, but he understood
Jesus within 1st-century Judaea,
and after reading his book
I travelled to Israel-Palestine
and visited archaeological sites
and museums. I still have my
notebooks from my travels.
I was such an archaeology nerd.OWhich books led you to
explore the unusual topic
of your new book, ‘What Did
Jesus Look Like?’?
I had a King James Version of
the Bible with pictures that
presented Jesus as a European
dressed in somewhat Arab
clothing. This was my template
for Jesus when I was young.
The book that first got me
started on thinking about what
Jesus really looked like was
Ian Wilson’sThe Turin Shroud.
The scientific studies and theresponses to them show how
much people really want
to “see” Jesus accurately. In
addition, Yigael Yadin’s book on
discoveries in ancient Dead Sea
caves,Bar-Kokhba, showing
brilliantly preserved clothing,
illuminated what Jesus wore.
Throughout my career, I’ve
always found the appearance
and clothing of historical figures
fascinating, but to say to my
fellow scholars that I really
wanted to work on Jesus’
sandals seemed a little light-
weight. As a woman in a male-
dominated field, I could imagine
certain male colleagues
commenting knowingly that
I was interested in “fashion”.
Now I just don’t care about
that! And also, the body and
ancient dress have both become
more mainstream subjects
of study.OWhich general accounts of the
iconography of Jesus across the
centuries would you recommend?
Thomas Mathews’The Clash of
Godsand Robin Jensen’sFace
to Faceare my top picks for
exploring how Jesus has been
visualised over the centuries.OWhat is the last book
you gave as a gift, and to whom?
I am also a creative writer
(usually under the name Joan
Norlev Taylor), and I gave a
copy of a collection in which
I have a short story –Fresh Ink- to my mother and two friends.
OWhat books do you have on
your desk waiting to be read?
Mary Beard’s wonderfulWomen
and Powerand M. R. James’
Ghost Stories. I always love the
fact that James, like me, could
combine historical work with
creative writing. I also think that
having the tendency to imagine
has led me on to this topic of
Jesus’ physical appearance,
because a fiction writer needs
to imagine what a character
looks like.Joan Taylor is professor of
Christian origins and Second
Temple Judaism at King’s
College London. Her latest book
isWhat Did Jesus Look Like?
(Bloomsbury).Joan Taylor
SHELF LIFE
with the manipulative political
strategies of the University of
Chicago, which became a big
player in urban planning by capi-
talising on federal funding in the
1950s. Finally, the relationship
between the creative classes, gentri-
fication and innovation is explored
in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This
provides a salutary lesson about
the havoc that can be caused to a
city when a university, in this case
Harvard, overreaches itself finan-
cially. The book also touches on
the relationship between rent,
talent and innovation, which is a
serious problem on both sides of
the Atlantic.
This is a remarkably timely
book that needs to be read by any
university in expansionist mode.
“The expanding city of
knowledge”, writes Winling,
“remains a highly contested form,
bringing conflict and creative
destruction to the communities
that must negotiate the new
cultural, social, and economic
opportunities of higher education
and the information society.”
Universities often favour the shiny
and new, as a brassy symbol of
“innovation”, over sensitive,
sustainable and incremental reuse.
A great deal of bureaucracy goes
into ensuring that the activity of
academics is ethically up to par:
shouldn’t that apply to their
estates departments as well?Flora Samuel is professor of
architecture in the built
environment, University of
Reading.Landscape of knowledge PICTURES: GETTY/ALAMY
Harvard (above) was one focus of
the development that sprung up
around the Boston area