The Testament of Man (1943–1960), a twelve-volume series of novels by the American author Vardis Fisher, traces the physical, psychological and spiritual evolution of Western civilization from Australopithecus to the present.
By his own account, Fisher read more than 2,000 books and essays on a wide range of subjects - religion, anthropology, archaeology, music, food, psychology, evolution and climate.
One recurrent character is the misunderstood male genius, the neurotic thinker who suddenly grasps a unique thought that becomes increasingly influential to future generations.
The controversial subject matter met with frequent, scathing denunciation that centered on three elements - his treatment of religion, sexual content and anthropological conclusions.
is presented as a sort of Old Testament Sammy Glick with chin whiskers, a tough opportunist who elbows his way into the big money, marries a glamor girl (Khate, an Egyptian princess), and hires a frustrated poet to ghost his copy—even, it would seem, such copy as the Book of Proverbs.
The real Solomon, according to Fisher, was a phony liberal with a father complex and a massive sexual overcompensation; his quarrel with the prophet Ahijah was an exchange of irrelevancies between a dilettante and a fanatic.
Fisher considered religion not as a cultural, collective phenomenon but as the consequences of individual insight due to sexual longings, loneliness and genius.