G. K. Chesterton Books

A classy Ignatius edition of the Father Brown stories. The design and tone of the book has venerable written all over it; it's wonderful to hold, big and thick (like its author), and the typeset is old fashioned by design. As for the stories, they're vintage Chesterton - wickedly wry, deceptively cogent, spare, hilarious and full to the brim with cagey things. Chesterton's mind in bloom! It's so right that Lady Marchmain often read Father Brown stories aloud in the evenings, before supper at Brideshead; it was Waugh's submissive nod to Chesterton. He recognized the master. This is a beautiful, soul-toned edition of the wily tales of the pertinent priest, a work that is among the purest in English literature. Recommended, with kudos to Ignatius Books.

This 650-page behemoth contains some of the most passionate and lyrical non-fiction by GK that I've come across. His travel commentaries reel off so many inspired observations and insights on such a broad range of topics, it's almost impossible to summarize.

"Christendom in Dublin" is a real gem. While visiting Dublin to attend the Eucharistic Congress of 1932, GK waxes eloquent on conversion, the Eucharist as the essence of faith, and the singular truth of Christ he finds amid the incredible shapes and sizes of the Faith and the faithful. A couple quotes:

"There are those who tell us we must broaden our ideas, by which they mean disembody or discolour them, in order to make a universal religion for men...The truth is flatly the other way."

"And I sometimes wondered whether even political democracy would not be a little more practical if people prepared for the General Election as they did for the Eucharistic Congress, with prayer and penance rather than with publicity and lies."

"The New Jerusalem" is a poetic description of the city seen in the light of its awesome history, as well as a penetrating commentary on Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and modern Europe.

"It is really not so repulsive to see the poor asking for money as to see the rich asking for more money. And advertisement is the rich asking for more money."

"As for our own society, if it proceeds at its present rate of progress and improvement, no trace or memory of it will be left at all. Some think this would be an improvement in itself." How prophetic!

"A Short History of England", which contains no actual dates (!), shows GK at his absolute best when it comes to distilling general principles from a dizzying array of facts. His command of the facts is superb, and his interpretation, which stood in stark contrast to the conventional wisdom of the time, rings truer than ever and ought to be heard.

"The ninteenth-century historians went on the curious principle of dismissing all people of whom tales are told, and concentrating upon people of whome nothing is told."

Speaking of the existence of an external God and against the idea of faith as a purely interior phenomenon, he says, "I do not, in my private capacity, believe that a baby gets his best physical food by sucking his thumb; nor that a man gets his best moral food by sucking his soul, and denying its dependence on God or other good things. I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder."

What is particularly helpful in this history is GK's accounting of England's great historical transitions--from barbarism to medieval society, from the Middle Ages to "Reformation", and from there to modern capitalism. He is unsurpassed in his ability to discern the subtle shifts in attitude and social convention that set the stage for monumental change.

Without doubt, one of the strongest non-fiction volumes in the entire Ignatius collection.

This volume of "The Collected Works" contains GK's weekly essays for "The Illustrated London News" from 1917 through 1919. He writes mainly about the Great War, Germany, the problems of the peace, various forms of socialism, and Bolshevism. For GK, the Great War was nothing less than a battle between Christendom and barbarianism. He pounds Prussia and Prussianism into the ground with relentlessly logical arguments, and a recounting of facts so obvious and fundamental that they seem to have been overlooked by the pacifists, socialists and other war critics of the time. His perspective on American culture, Wilson, The League of Nations, the Russian Revolution, Poland, France, capitalism, on and on, are truly fascinating and blend together to provide an incredibly vivid picture of the political and social forces at work in Europe in this enormously complicated and tumultuous period. This book should be required reading for any college course on World War I.

These 3-5 page editorials cover the usual wide range of social, political, historical, literary and moral topics GK wrote about with so much gusto. As an added bonus, this volume contains about five months-worth of wonderful essays written by Hilaire Belloc, who pinch-hit while GK was traveling.

Rather than make a feeble attempt to summarize the brilliance and scope of these essays, I'll take just one as an example, April 1, 1922. In just a few pages, GK deals with business ethics, excessive societal legalism, science versus religion, the breakdown of law and order, moral chaos, the dangers of bureaucracy, and the dangers of amorally applied science--all in a way that is completely relevant today. Some quotes...

"...for the modern man is in favour of introducing order into everything except his own ideas."

"...it is just as possible to organise slackness as to organize efficiency..."

"It is much nearer the truth to say that they [the police] fail because society is being far too much organised. A scheme of official control which is too ambitious for human life has broken down...instead of law being a strong cord to bind what it is really possible to bind, it has become a thin net to cover what it is quite impossible to cover."

"The truth is that any advance in science leaves morality in its ancient balance; and it depends still on the inscrutable soul of man whether any discovery is mainly a benefit or mainly a calamity. This is, perhaps, the strongest argument for a morality superior to materialism, and a religion that refuses to be bullied by science."

"For mind as much as machinery depends for its good or evil not on its force, but on its direction."

Well worth contemplating eighty years later!

Volumes 27-37 of the Ignatius Press Collected Works series cover weekly essays Chesterton wrote for "The Illustrated London News". Here in Vol. XXXIII, GK's writing is as humorous and perceptive as ever, as he tackles all sorts of topics, including evolution, Prohibition, current affairs in Europe, Capitalism, Socialism, English literature, Leopold and Loeb...His opinions are almost always relentlessly logical, devastatingly trenchant, and yet well-mannered and good-natured. Every word is to be savored. Although some of the issues GK takes on are forgotten, the insights he draws from them live on!

This book was written by Chesterton during World War I to show that the war was, in part, England's fault for supporting Prussia and allowing her to get away with almost anything. His purpose is summed up very well in the first chapter, which is a letter to Professor Whirlwind, a German/Prussian supporter and writer. Chesterton says:
"There is a very great deal that is really wrong with England, and it ought not to be forgotten even in the full blaze of your marvellous mistakes. I cannot have my countrymen tempted to those pleasures of intellectual pride which are the result of comparing themselves with you. The deep collapse and yawning chasm of your ineptitude leaves me upon a perilous spiritual elevation."

This then, is what he attempts to do: to show that England should not be smug and think themselves simply the defenders of humanity (though they may be that), but England should realize that they helped Prussia come to power, and they dealt poorly with the French Revolution and Napoleon, which let to some serious problems in Chesterton's day. Also, Chesterton blasts England for their poor treatment of the Irish, which were at the time involved in the home rule movement.

Why does Chesterton do all of this? He think it is patriotic. He said in an essay entitled A Defense of Patriotism (found in his first book of essays entitled The Defendant) that "love is not blind...love is vigilant." He thought, I think correctly, that if one really loves their country one will do what is best for it, not simply say it is the best. And sometimes what is best for it is to tell it that it has made mistakes, so that it will not make them again. Chesterton says near the end of the book that "I have passed the great part of my life in criticizing and condemning the existing rulers and institutions of my country: I think it is infinitely the most partiotic thing that a man can do."

This book gives an excellent glimpse into the situation in England during World War I, as well as an excellent view of what Chesterton considered patriotism to be. Of course, it is filled with witty and deep remarks, as all of Chesterton's works are.

Overall grade: A

G.K.Chesterton is the best critic of Dickens, and these introductions to his novels his best work. If you are seeking an answer to why Dickens is so enduring, these short essays will answer you. If you are already a Dickensian, these essays are a delightful condensed expression of everything you already know. A pity that it is out of print. It is THE book I try to give to friends who want an introduction to Dickens.

There's also a Listmania! List of books included, so you can see how much the books would cost if purchased individually (by the way, at the time of this writing, the total costs of the books are $400).

St. Thomas Aquinas
Summa Theologica Part I
Summa Theologica Part I-II
Summa Theologica Part II-II
Summa Theologica Part III

St. Augustine
The City of God
Confessions
On Christian Doctrine

St. Teresa of Avila
The Interior Castle, or the Mansions
The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
The Way of Perfection

Third Council of Baltimore
The Baltimore Catechism No. 1
The Baltimore Catechism No. 2
The Baltimore Catechism No. 3
The Baltimore Catechism No. 4

Hilaire Belloc
The Free Press

Monsignior Robert Hugh Benson
Lourdes

Gilbert K. Chesterton
The Ball and the Cross
Eugenics and Other Evils
Heretics
Manalive
The Man Who Was Thursday
Orthodoxy
What's Wrong with the World

Rev. M. J. Frings
The Excellence of the Rosary

Thomas a Kempis
The Imitation of Christ

Joyce Kilmer
Main Street and Other Poems
Trees and Other Poems

St. Alphonsus de Liguori
Uniformity with God's Will

St. Therese of Lisieux
Story of a Soul

St. Ignatius of Loyola
The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola

St. Thomas More
Utopia

John Henry Newman
Apologia Pro Vita Sua

Blaise Pascal
Pensees

St. Francis de Sales
Introduction to the Devout Life

Brother Ugolino
The Little Flowers of Saint Francis

I'm sorry to misuse the customer review opportunity, but I need to alert you to the fact that the author of the "Editorial Review" has probably not read the book -- at least not "Orthodoxy". He states: "In Orthodoxy, Gilbert K. Chesterton explains how and why he came to believe in Christianity and more specifically the Catholic Church's brand of orthodoxy." In fact, Chesterton wrote Orthodoxy many years before he became a Catholic. Please correct the editorial review. Then you may removew this review.

Since someone else inserted a correction in the other volume, I will do so with this one. How can one decide to purchase this fiction volume if no contents are listed? The cover picture won't be enough for most readers. Presumably it won't just contain some of the 51 Father Brown stories. :)