Since Chesterton and Shaw so vehemently disagreed with each other on many topics, one would expect this quick text to be filled with antagonism. Instead, it is a delightful explanation of Shaw's background, biography and beliefs, told in a gentle, light-hearted manner. Chesterton shows a great respect for his adversary, while making clear his own views through quite a few of the one-sentence quotables for which he is well known.

The author does a fine job here of critiquing Gilbert Keith Chesterton and his political and social views. She glances briefly at his fiction novels and shows how they help illuminate his populism and then proceeds to study Chesterton's own political writings. She does a fine job of explaining his thoughts and arguments and his populism, unusual in England at that time. The Chesterton wit is as evident as always in this study, with numerous fine and intelligent quotes. The author studies how Chesterton's religious views did or did not impact upon his political ones, and also studies Chesterton's take on numerous issues. Concise, well-written and recommended for any fan of politics or of good writers.

This book a compendium of papers presented at a college campus in Seattle in which the works and achievement of G.K. Chesterton and C.S. Lewis were celebrated. Interesting reading for Lewis and Chesterton fans.

If you are a "fan" of the fantasy books by Tolkien, C.S.Lewis, Charles Williams or Chesterton, then this is a book worth reading. It is a collection of essays by various authorities in literature, myth and theology. A couple of the contributors were acquainted with either Tolkien or Lewis. The central thesis running through this collection of essays is that mythic symbols found in folk-tales and religious rituals, all express a common, fundamental human yearning for healing and a return to a "lost paradise". The essayists draw on insights from religious phenomenology, Jungian analysis, Christian theology and literary interpretation to tease out the potent mythic symbols found in the writings of Tolkien, Lewis, Chesterton and Williams. Lewis, Williams and Tolkien were associated with one another as drinking partners in an informal literary club known as The Inklings. The essayists "test" their thesis about the power of myth to reveal our search for meaning through the novels of the Inklings. The essayists take us a step further to consider the Christian world-view that informed and shaped the writings of Tolkien, Lewis, Williams and Chesterton. Although a couple of the essays are slightly "dated", any one interested in fantasy literature would find the thesis very absorbing. It should be useful not merely to students of english literature but also to the general reader who might like to know more about the backdrop to The Lord of the Rings, Narnia, etc. Certainly a book to add to your list for reading if you enjoyed the novels!

This small book of platitudes written by Mr. Jackson is a fine example of the thought of the English gentlemen at the turn of the century. The comments written by Chesterton in response to these platitudes are further an excellent example of wit and clarity of thought that marks Chesterton's works. For one who wishes to quickly aquaint himself with Chesterton, this small volume is an excellent look at the man who cut through the verbiage of modern thought to get at the heart of truth. It is amusing and enlightening all at once.

I know it's a "classic collection", but after reading it, I have to wonder what all the fuss is about. I mean, do all the really worthy Father Brown stories come later, and we all praise these early ones out of misplaced fondness?

First, I'm left wondering: Who was that little man? Does he have a personality? Who was that little man who likes to show up at bizarre British crime scenes and make enigmatic statements after figuring everything out in two seconds? This is one shadowy, slippery great detective. Why did Sherlock Holmes or Nero Wolfe ever work so hard to establish such memorable, multi-faceted personalities? It would seem that's a lot of bother for nothing; just be like Father Brown, the cipher, fading in and out once in a while.

Cruel to pick on the Great Detective? Then let's talk about the plots, the cases, the whodunits. A more contrived, improbable collection of rummy circumstances, somehow resulting in ultimately unexciting deaths, I have never seen. And this so-called "locked-room" classic--'The Invisible Man'--well, in the real world, wouldn't one of the four witnesses keeping an eye on the scene in question at least mention the presence of a certain person, even if they didn't actually infer hostile intentions on the part of the so-called "invisible man"? That's all I can say: I wouldn't want to spoil this dull story for you.

The better entries: 'The Wrong Shape', The Sign of the Broken Sword', 'The Sins of Prince Saradine'--where I suppose the unfolding logic seems slightly less contrived than usual--and especially 'The Honour of Israel Gow', which at least had some authentic creepiness, and a solution that related to one man's idea of promises kept.

As for any wonderful spiritual signficance these stories are supposed to display...yes, I'm aware they starred a wise priest.

In recent weeks I have suffered from the rail conditions in South East England. I might have gone mad if not for this book (and a few others, of course). Each story was like getting involved in a cryptic crossword. The stories are weird, wonderful, sometimes quite horrific but always enthralling, and they keep you guessing till the end.

I had really enjoyed 'The Club of Queer Trades', and found 'Father Brown' had the same typically Chesterton style.

Father Brown reveals the dark side of human nature and revels in the unusual and fantastic. I only wish there were more stories.

Does anyone else write like this?

The 12 stories herein can of course be found in _The Complete Father Brown_, and _The Annotated Innocence of Father Brown_. This is the first Brown collection, which introduces not only Father Brown himself but Flambeau, the daring thief. Father Brown worked on Flambeau during their early confrontations, and eventually persuaded him to give up his life of crime. He became Father Brown's friend and sometime sidekick, and appears in three-quarters of the stories herein, in one capacity or another.

"The Blue Cross" - The great detective Valentin knows that Flambeau the thief has selected a little English priest as his target, since the priest has been entrusted with a valuable cross set with sapphires. But when Valentin begins tracking the priest across the city, a very odd pattern of incidents begins to emerge.

"The Secret Garden" - Father Brown is a dinner guest in Valentin's home.

"The Queer Feet" - 'The Twelve True Fishermen', meeting for their annual fish dinner at a small, exclusive restaurant, saw the usual count of waiters - but one had died hours before! Father Brown (called in earlier for the waiter's dying confession and last rites) unravels a spectacular caper.

"The Flying Stars" - Flambeau's last crime (as noted in the 1st paragraph of the story), cited as an example of his love of artistically matching settings with crimes. His confrontation with Father Brown resonates nicely with the preceding story's metaphor of Brown having him on a line like a fish.

"The Invisible Man" - Locked-room mystery. The inventor was found murdered in his flat, but witnesses say that nobody could have gone past them without being seen.

"The Honour of Israel Gow" - This story actually takes place *after* "The Wrong Shape". The Earl of Glengyle was a hermit - and after finding some very odd circumstances in the Earl's home after his death, Flambeau and Father Brown begin to fear that Satanism is involved.

"The Wrong Shape" - The writer was a bad husband and an unpleasant man, and the beautifully penned suicide note seemed almost too good to be true.

"The Sins of Prince Saradine" - Flambeau takes Father Brown along to collect on the prince's invitation, sent to him during his criminal career, to visit if he were to become respectable, since he greatly admired Flambeau's stunt of once arranging for one policeman to arrest another, when both were looking for *him*.

"The Hammer of God" - The last two Bohuns are the curate, who pursues the beauty of his church, and the colonel, who chases women. But if he managed to catch the blacksmith's wife, it may well have been the death of him.

"The Eye of Apollo" - Locked-room mystery. Father Brown came to visit Flambeau, who has taken an office in a new building. Pauline Stacey, a rich idealist in a neighbouring office, fell down the empty elevator shaft that same day - when nobody else, apparently, was in the building.

"The Sign of the Broken Sword" - Why has Father Brown taken Flambeau to every monument to the memory of the great general, finally ending here at his grave? "Where does a wise man hide a leaf? In a forest." Someone, unfortunately, once took that saying to heart.

"The Three Tools of Death" - With three weapons visible on the scene, why did the victim die by a fall from a window?

I enjoyed this book very much. The morals and lessons it teaches you are very important. It is the story of a lonely man, who because he was falsely accused of stealing and because this cost him all his relationships with people, he secluded himself in his lonely house along with all his gold that he saved up. He never spent his money because he enjoyed its company. His gold was his only companion for several years of his life. Then one day, he was robbed, and he no longer had anything worth living for.
Silas was slowly dying of misery and depression. He had no reason to live. Then one day a little girl walked into his house and into his life. Her mother died, leaving the baby girl as an orphan. So, Silas adopted her and took her into his home. She grew up a poor, hard-working girl who loved her new father Silas and vice-versa. Because of this new daughter of his, Silas changed for the better. He became more caring and devoted to someone else besides himself. He started to go to church again and changed his views on what really was important in life. And one day when his treasure was found and returned to him, he didn't even care for it. He had something even more precious than gold: someone to love and receive love from.

I first read Silas Marner when I was 18 years old, and loved every word. I started reading it again immediately after finishing it! As said in other reviews, perhaps 9th grade is indeed too early because at that age, this older language style is difficult to "get into" quickly enough to hold their interest. I found myself wrapped in this little town with its odd characters and gossip, and wished I'd lived there. The imagery is so strong and sweet I still refer to the scenery evoked by this novel when I read completely unrelated historical articles! The story itself cannot be called remarkable because it is one of the basic stories about humanity and what matters in life. Yet George Eliot surpasses all others in the telling of it. There is a reason this book is on all the reading lists -- it is a great achievement.

This is the uplifting story of Silas Marner, a 19th century English working man, who seems to be greatly wronged repeatedly by people in his community. As an elegible young man, a rival framed him out of greed as well as envy, leaving Marner wrongly accused of theft, upon which he relocates in a different locality. For some 15 years, Marner lives like a hermit, hording the money he earns as a weaver. Said to be "in with the wicked one", possessing strange magic, town folk avoid contact with the mysterious man. -- Suddenly, in short succesion, two events change the life of Master Marner forever, even restoring his faith in a Supreme Being and the good in his fellow man.

Without reveiling the surprises held by this wonderful story, I can highly recommend this book to readers of teen age and above. Written in a very high English, the writing style is that of an educated master of the language, uncommon to be written or spoken in this manner for some 100 years. Less difficult than Shakespeare, still challenging to a young person unfamiliar with countless terms and expressions that seem to be very dated.

As a teacher partial to language arts studies, I am very impressed by this book. I would recommend it for classroom use at the junior high school level or above. A masterpiece!*****

"Irish Tenure" has some witty moments, but they are few and far between. As a matter of fact, the wittiest part of the book is the title! (Irish Tenure--tenor. Get it?) The puzzle centers on a long-lost story of G.K. Chesterton, and the political faculty catfights of academe. There are some dry little jokes scattered about, and some clever puns, but not much in the way of plot to involve us or characters to care about. In the end, it is a relief to put the book down. To phrase the final words of Ralph McInerny, "It's the only tenure that matters."

Combine Notre Dame's Knight brothers, an arrogant senior faculty member, a rare book dealer, a spurned husband, an undiscovered G.K. Chesterton "Father Brown" story, several priests, and the dead body of a young faculty member up for tenure and you have the ingredients for McInerny's entertaining mystery.

At times the book is a bit hard to follow. Set exclusively at the University of Notre Dame, the book is so detailed in this regard that anyone unfamiliar with the campus may feel like an outsider reading the book. The book is formulaic, a bit predictable, and McInerny has the habit of assuming that his readers are schooled in foreign languages as he frequently tosses in Latin and French expressions that the lay reader may find frustrating.

However,the book offers an insightful and witty look at tenure and the politics of a university campus, and takes some shots at the "political correctness" found on campuses. The author of more than 20 books, including the Father Dowling mysteries, McInerny does know how to tell a tale.

Those familiar with the University of Notre Dame, fans of McInerney's mysteries, or fans of G.K. Chesterton will find this mystery particularly enjoyable.

Ralph McInerny, best known for his Father Dowling mysteries, has here produced not so much a mystery story but rather a slice of life from the campus of Notre Dame, which he knows so well. Anyone expecting a clear-cut mystery story where someone turns up dead at the start, with the rest of the book devoted to a singleminded pursuit of the culprit, will be sorely disappointed and should look elsewhere. The murder happens very late in the book and the murderer is pretty obvious.

IRISH TENURE is more like Malcolm Bradbury than Agatha Christie. McInerny shows the dark side of academic life (even at so august an institution an Notre Dame): the catfight for tenure. The structure is loose and seems at first rambling and discursive, but McInerny winds it all together eventually. Until then, he gives subtle character studies of the sorts of people who drift into academia: those intelligent enough to be professors but somehow haven't managed into the tenure track; those who are tenured and probably shouldn't be; those who need and or deserve to be tenured; the evil necessity to publish or perish . . .

He also takes long overdue pot-shots, sometimes poignant and sometimes hilarious, at political correctness, especially regarding draconian modern ideas of sexual harrassment.

The plot, such as it is, is centered on the discovery of every Chestertonian's dream, a long-lost Father Brown story. IRISH TENURE will prove a joy for fans of G.K. Chesterton, for most of the main characters live and breathe his works. For the uninitiated, therefore, the book will doubtlessly prove confusing. Chesterton enthusiasts will find piquant prose, and enjoy spending time with like-minded characters who have found that Chesterton adds zest to life.

The main disappointment is that there is no genuine long-lost story appended to the end of the tale; but that's just as well, for McInerny's work would've suffered in the comparison. And we can be thankful that McInerny didn't attempt a pastiche.

The first time I read this book, I felt almost as impatient with Chesterton's "verbosity" and "hot air" as some of the reviewers below. In regard to the bare facts of Francis' life, one comes to feel a bit as Chesterton said of the Troubadours' lovers: "The reader realises that the lady is the most beautiful being that can possibly exist, only he has occasional doubts as to whether she does exist." Moments came when I found myself thirsting for dry facts. But I think the problem is that Chesterton assumes his readers, as educated persons of his period, know the story already, and only need to be enlightened as to its meaning. One can get facts anywhere. Few can take us inside the thinking of a man like Francis. And absolutely no one I know writes with such entertaining flair, of a healing kind so different from modern books and movies that wound our souls with their pleasures.

On second reading, I find I enjoyed this episode about as much as the biography of Dickens -- which was very much. Chesterton looks at Francis, in varying cadences, from the inside, to help us think and feel as he did, then from the outside, as children of the Enlightenment, a two-perspective approach that gives us a rounded figure. Those of us who have no other knowledge of Francis may sometimes wonder how much of that figure is Francis and how much Chesterton, (who was, after all, probably the more rounded of the two). But the insights are always brilliant. And many still cut like daggers. (Or rather scalpels, to heal.) "We read that Admiral Bangs has been shot, which is the first intimation we have that he has ever been born." "The moment sex ceases to be a servant it becomes a tyrant." "All goods look better when they look like gifts." "There is only one intelligent reason why a man does not believe in miracles and that is that he does believe in materialism." Anyone who finds such digressions merely "hot air," would be best advised to keep to dry-as-dust historical commentaries, or skeptical comic books, as the case may be.

This book is not so much a biography of a single man, as an episode in Chesterton's ongoing spiritual biography of mankind. It is one in a series of what Solzhenitsyn called "knots" and Thomas Cahill calls "hinges" of history. The series continues with Chesterton's equally subjective but enlightening biographies of Chaucer, Dickens, Joan of Arc, and modern "Heretics." He gives the outline of the project in the Everlasting Man, which is one of the most brilliant and wisest books of the century.

As a non-Catholic Christian ("Protestant" would place the emphasis in the wrong place), I don't agree with Chesterton's take on the Albigensian Wars, and am more ambivalent about the Crusades than he. But he does not exactly justify the Inquisition, as the reader below implies; he admits that in later stages it was a "horrible thing that might be haunted by demons." How many modern leftists admitted that much about, say, the Russian Revolution? But I agree he may try to "understand" the sins committed by his side a little too hard.

author, Jesus and the Religions of Man (July 2000)

d.marshall@sun.ac.jp

G.K. Chesterton is one of the most interesting people who ever lived. His prodigious output and outlandish appearance have made him an unforgettable part of Western culture. But in this book, we have the eccentric Chesterton writing about the even more astounding character of St. Francis of Assisi. Chesterton goes through several interesting sketches of St. Francis' life (which are interesting by themselves) and then draws all sorts of fantastic conclusions from the episodes. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who is curious about Chesterton's writing and Francis' life.

G.K. Chesterton's "St. Francis of Assisi" is not your conventional timeline of the events in a man's life. Instead, Chesterton focuses on Francis' relationship with God and his historical context, background and impact. I first read this book a year ago and have just read it again - it's one of those books that are so rich that you discover something new each time you pick it up. If you've ever read "The Little Flowers of St. Francis" (about the events in Francis' life), this is the book to read next. It is a great aid to understanding Francis as a person and not just as "the bird bath saint". I highly recommend this book.

Few writers of the last century deserve a more drastic upward revision in their reputations and popularity than Chesterton. His magnificent prose, humanity and gift for paradox shine through his writings. His account in this volume of American culture and society exemplifies these strengths, and is the reason for my awarding it a second star. Yet this volume also includes his worst book by a long way, namely his first-hand account of Italy under Mussolini. This book doesn't approach the mendacity of some starry-eyed intellectuals who travelled to the Potemkin Villages of the Soviet Union and came back with glowing accounts of happy and fulfilled proletarians - Shaw and the Webbs, Henry Wallace (Roosevelt's Vice-President), and their equivalents (Susan Sontag, Noam Chomsky) who travelled as political pilgrims to China, Vietnam, Cuba and Nicaragua more recently. But it is still indefensible, and we admirers of Chesterton will just have to admit it. The author is massively confused; he goes on for pages and pages skirting round the question of whether he's for or against the Fascists. I'm afraid he even explicitly commends to his readers' attention the system of Fascist Syndicalism in preference to capitalism ("[A] policy ... which is worthy of a sharp and close attention which it has hardly received. It is not Socialism; it is not Distributism; but it is distinguished and divided in a most startling manner from anything to which we are accustomed as Capitalism.") All in all, this volume shows us a good and gentle man out of his depth; I'm sorry the book is in print and cannot recommend it.

Though Chesterton died in 1936, his What I Saw In America presents an analysis of American (and British) life and culture which is as pertinent today as ever. Delivered with his delicately delightful wit, only his mild tendency toward wordiness keeps this book from a 5-star rating.