Royal Autobiography in the Book of Qoheleth

Book excerpt: This study is concerned with the literary genre to which the book of Qoheleth belongs and on which it is modelled. It covers various aspects of literary analysis and the problem of making sense of the book as a whole. It suggests that Qoheleth is best described as a royal autobiography based on the arguments of specific literary features of style and content, resemblance to various kinds of royal autobiographical narrative from elsewhere in the ancient Near East, and the existence of a coherent worldview which the author presents as the fruit of his lifelong observations of the world.