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.
The Waters of Ius and Freedom
“[Hawley] attempts to convince us that Cicero is an invaluable resource for an introduction to Western philosophy. He is the true republican symbol that links the common liberty of popular sovereignty to the private liberty of individuals.”
Gateway to the Dissident Right
“…MacIntyre explains how the COVID lockdowns and 2020 riots made America unrecognizable to him, prompting study into thinkers of more hard-nosed questions of power relationships. A conventional understanding of America’s Constitution as protecting against arbitrary government power did not explain what was really happening, hence a question: ‘what if the story our leaders have repeated endlessly about liberal democracy and popular sovereignty has actual served to expand the power of the state to unprecedented levels, all while assuring the ruled that they live in an era of freedom unlike any that’s ever been experienced?’ From this paradox, MacIntyre advances his understanding of the ‘total state.’”
Susan Cooper on the Moral Imagination in Fantasy Fiction
“From stories about brave warriors battling mighty dragons to epic sagas about magic rings and lyrical Arthurian tales set among mist-shrouded mountains, fantasy fiction has always connected with readers at the deepest level. Among the best writers of this genre is Susan Cooper, who writes beautifully poetic stories, like those of Tolkien and Lewis, that we will have with us for generations.”
Gerald Russello: The Man Who Did It All
“Gerald believed deeply in the power of the conservative imagination, and I believe the essays and reviews in this volume showcase one dedicated man’s imagination at its best, working to preserve the Permanent Things for the next generation and beyond.”
Russello Classic: The Age of Addiction
Gerald J. Russello reviews a book on the cultivation of consumer desire and its discontents.
The Fourth Awokening and Its Discontents
“Each of the ‘Great Awokenings’ thus have a common cause: elite overproduction, a situation in which there are more people who feel entitled to elite positions than there are such positions available.”
Dissonance and Faith
“While billed as an accessible and clarifying introductory guide to the ideas that shaped the New Testament, I would not endorse this description of Spencer’s book. It is not a book for beginners, nor an introduction, nor a clarifying guide. It is, rather, a mineshaft—dark, with dim lighting—in which the wary may yet strike treasure.”
Prudence in the Political Philosophy of George Washington
“What is apparent from reading Washington’s private letters and public documents is that his political ideas were formed from experience and sober assumptions about the possibilities of politics. He was repeatedly reminded by his experience in political affairs of the limits and challenges of politics.”
Hope in the Past, Hope in the Future
“Stephen Presley proposes a model of cultural engagement that looks to the earliest centuries of the Church, its fledgling period before the so-called ‘Constantinian shift.’ Given the ongoing dismantling of the structures of Christendom, the earliest period of the Church offers an ever more fitting parallel to ours, one in which religious devotion is regarded not merely as irrelevant but increasingly as a threat to social order.”
The Book Gallery
A collection of conversations with Bookman editor Luke C. Sheahan and writers and authors of imagination and erudition.
Join us tomorrow night as @JamesPanero, Adam Simon, and @lsheahan discuss the Haunted House on the Book Gallery at 6pm ET: https://buff.ly/tRXeumD
"Voegelin argued that history itself lacked any patterns discernible for the political philosopher. All that was constant was a person’s experience of the divine..." @lee_trepanier
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