Since the 1981 publication of Marilynne Robinson’s novel Housekeeping—a stunning debut that was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize—she has built a reputation not only as a writer of sharp, subtly moving prose, but also as a rigorous thinker and incisive essayist. Her compelling and demanding collection The Death of Adam—in which she reflected on her Presbyterian upbringing, investigated the roots of Midwestern abolitionism and mounted a memorable defense of Calvinism—is respect