The University Bookman

Reviewing Books that Build Culture

Support the University Bookman during our annual Kirktober Fundraiser, and receive an audio copy of Kirk’s short story, What Shadows We Pursue.

Kirktober 2025: James Panero and Adam Simon on the Haunted House

October 28, 2025

On Tuesday, October 28, at 6:00 PM, you are invited to join University Bookman editor Luke Sheahan, Hollywood screenwriter Adam Simon, and New Criterion executive editor James Panero, as they explore the theme of the haunted house in gothic literature and its relationship to conservative thought and imagination.

Register for this free webinar here.

Defending the Christian Faith

“In 100 Tough Questions For Catholics: Common Obstacles To Faith Today… David G. Bonagura, Jr. gives bite-sized answers to dozens of big questions about the faith.”

The Other Greek Woman

“Felson’s Penelope, who seems, in all probability, very close to Homer’s Penelope, is the faithful wife of Odysseus, but she is also the independent and flirtatious matriarch who rules over her household and teases the suitors, whom she views as her ‘geese.’”

Following Dante’s Footsteps

“For Krause, poetry has always been about love—about the heavens and the burning passion of the human heart that thirsts after the embodiment of Love itself. This longing, he argues, anticipates the coming of Christ… All of literature and poetry, in this view, gesture toward incarnation…”

Suicide Narratives and the Goodness of Being

“Lockerd, drawing on the literary resources of the Catholic tradition, suggests a different tack: perhaps the essential goodness of reality does not always demand a leap into the unknown, a venture of faith against all odds. Rather, that goodness might be glimpsed everywhere around us.”

Why We Need Liverpool

WILLIAM ANTHONY HAY While traveling with Tsar Alexander and the allied army campaigning against Napoleon as Britain’s ambassador in 1813, the Earl of Aberdeen remarked that “the heroes we read of at a distance with respect dwindle into minor figures at a near...

The Wonder of Medieval Europe

The Templars: The Rise and Spectacular Fall of God’s Holy Warriors by Dan Jones. Viking, 2017. Hardcover, 448 pages, $30. TIMOTHY D. LUSCH “Two types of humanity were the wonder of medieval Europe: the great saint and the great knight.” So declared Russell Kirk in his...

Not Only Narnia: Lewis as Political Thinker

The Intellectual World of C. S. Lewis by Alister E. McGrath. Wiley-Blackwell, 2014. Paperback, 191 pages, $36. C. S. Lewis on Politics and the Natural Law by Justin Buckley Dyer and Micah J. Watson. Cambridge University Press, 2016. Paperback, 160 pages, $27. GARY L....

An Iron Lady Recast

Margaret Thatcher: Shaping the New Conservatism by Meredith Veldman. Oxford University Press, 2016. Paperback, 232 pages, $16.95. CHRIS BUTYNSKYI The clock is counting down in England. Brexit (the exit of Britain from the European Union) is set to officially begin at...

The Evangelical Political Mind

American Apocalypse: A History of Modern Evangelicalism by Matthew Avery Sutton. Belknap Press, 2014 (2017). Paperback, 480 pages, $23. MATTHEW STOKES So much of the recent scholarly work done on evangelicals has focused on correlating characteristics of evangelicals:...

A Coat of Varnish

A Coat of Varnish

The Odyssey by Homer, translated by Emily Wilson. W. W. Norton & Company, 2017. Hardcover, 592 pages, $40. Reviewed by John Byron Kuhner Genius, said Goethe, reveals itself under conditions of constraint; great minds gather strength from limitation, be it the keys...

Zuckerberg’s Philosopher

The Orange Trees of Marrakesh: Ibn Khaldun and the Science of Man by Stephen Frederic Dale. Harvard University Press, 2015. Hardcover, 400 pages, $31. JAMES KALB This book, written, by an emeritus professor at Ohio State, is a useful and quite readable companion to...

Sparring Theists

Five Proofs of the Existence of God by Edward Feser. Ignatius Press, 2017. Paperback, 336 pages, $20. CASEY CHALK Almost fifteen years ago, Sam Harris’s best-seller The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reasoninaugurated what became known as the New...

A Liberal Pope for a Conservative Church

To Change the Church: Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism by Ross Douthat. Simon & Schuster, 2018. Hardcover, 256 pages, $26. Lost Shepherd: How Pope Francis Is Misleading His Flock by Philip F. Lawler. Regnery Gateway, 2018. Hardcover, 256 pages, $27....

The Book Gallery

A collection of conversations with Bookman editor Luke C. Sheahan and writers and authors of imagination and erudition.

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