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.
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 Sacredness of Life: An Unbought Grace
“Two new books by former abortion providers chronicle how far this noble profession has fallen from grace, as it has been corrupted by the avarice and dull materialism of our age. They also show how the nobility of the physician can be reclaimed by returning to first principles and recognizing the sacredness of life…”
The Social Gospel for Our Times
“Newson’s privileging of our temporal horizontal relationships with one another over our spiritual vertical relationship with God… has the tendency to reduce all human relationships to material ones rooted in power.”
Political Exodus in America
“…we have in American Refugees a quite worthwhile and entertaining discussion of the experience of one refugee’s relocation from the most liberal of states to one of the most conservative, though conservative in ways that the author did not entirely anticipate.”
Can the United States Have a Good History?
“Midwesterners believed in Christianity, optimism, tolerance, local involvement, equality, and embracing hard work, including physical work, while avoiding luxury. They lived out their values by extensive reading, attending public lectures, and founding colleges and primary schools that taught character.”
The Book Gallery
A collection of conversations with Bookman editor Luke C. Sheahan and writers and authors of imagination and erudition.
Today is the 4th anniversary of @ubookman editor Gerald Russello. Please pray for him.
@KirkCenter is sponsoring its annual Russello Lecture on 12/8 at FordhamU in NYC. @JamesPanero to speak on Russell Kirk's "urbanity." More info and registration here:
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