Lincoln, Burke, and the Politics of Prudence
Old Whigs: Burke, Lincoln, and the Politics of Prudence by Greg Weiner. Encounter Books, 2019. Hardcover, 184 pages, $24. Reviewed by Kyle Sammin More books have been written about Abraham Lincoln than any other man, excepting only Jesus Christ, who all must admit is...
Sacrificial Crisis
Heroes of the Fourth Turning by Will Arbery, directed by Danya Taymore Playwrights Horizons (New York), September 13–November 17, 2019. Reviewed by Trevor C. Merrill Will Arbery has described his new play as a six-part fugue. Its subject—the kernel from which the rest...
‘Out of the Silent Planet’ and a New Era of Science Fiction
By John Tuttle The 1930s was a decade sprinkled with literature of all sorts that related fantastic tales concerning the goings-on of Mars and its inhabitants. Throughout the thirties, there were several installments of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s book series John Carter...
The Age of Addiction
Packaged Pleasures. How Technology and Marketing Revolutionized Desire by Gary S. Cross and Robert N. Proctor. University of Chicago Press, 2014. Hardcover, 351 pages, $35. Reviewed by Gerald J. Russello The age of industry was—is—also an age of addiction. We like the...
Fortunate Naivety
Jean Vanier: Portrait of a Free Man by Anne-Sophie Constant. Plough, 2019. Paperback, 250 pages, $18. Reviewed by Matthew Loftus About a decade ago came a minor skirmish in the ongoing fight among evangelicals about our disposition towards the faith that goes back...
Taking Serious Poetry Seriously
Poetry and Theology in the Modernist Period by Anthony Domestico. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017. Hardcover, 168 pages, $29.95. Reviewed by J. L. Wall Literary modernism resembles the Ottoman Empire at the turn of the twentieth century: the sick old man of...
Longing for Home
Nostalgia: Going Home in a Homeless World by Anthony Esolen. Regnery, 2018.Hardcover, 256 pages, $29. Reviewed by Henry George The declaration of political homelessness, feeling bereft of the consolation that being rooted in support for a political party can give, is...
The Cost of Cultural Free-Riders
Why Culture Matters Most by David C. Rose. Oxford University Press, 2019. Hardcover, 197 pages, $35. Reviewed by J. Daniel Hammond David Rose’s Why Culture Matters Most tackles a question that economists have been loath to take on—the connection between morals and...
T. K. Rabb: In Memoriam
As 2019 begins to wind down, we take stock of the year and note the gaps left by our losses. One such loss is Theodore (T. K.) Rabb, professor emeritus of history at Princeton University, who passed away this January. Born in Czechoslovakia in 1937 to a Jewish...
Summer is here and the days are long. Slowing schedules allow time for many of us to sink into the queue of books that have been patiently waiting for us over the busyness of our end of spring schedules.
@lsheahan, @DavidGBonaguraJ, @darrellfalconbu
Ah, just your typical 663-page light summer beach read for a @ubookman book review. Makes Wealth of Nations look like a Substack essay.