James J. O'Donnell has been Provost of Georgetown University since 2002. He is a distinguished scholar and recognized innovator in the application of networked information technology in higher education. In addition to his duties as Provost, O'Donnell is a member of the faculty of Georgetown's Classics department. He has served as president of the American Philological Association, the primary professional association for classicists in the United States and Canada, and has been elected a Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America.

The "Confessions" of Augustine have long both demanded and eluded the sustained and serious attention to detail that a scholarly commentary can provide. The present work, which is in three volumes, seeks to supplement that lack. A revised Latin text of the Confessions in Volume I forms the basis for a detailed line-by-line commentary (Volumes II and III) designed to elucidate the many layers of meaning in the work. Placing the emphasis primarily on exegesis, Professor O'Donnell opens up new lines of interpretation, as well as giving fresh detail to some more familiar themes. At the same time, he clears the way for further scholarly work by furnishing the materials for others to draw on to press the task of interpretation further. A particular feature of the commentary is its attention to the influences in the "Confessions" of other texts of the Greek and Latin traditions; whilst the place of the "Confessions" in Augustine's own life and in the history of Christian literature is also discussed and illuminated.