The University Bookman

Reviewing Books that Build Culture

What the American Revolution Secured: Order, Justice, and Freedom

Throughout the semiquincentennial year celebrating America’s independence, The University Bookman will invite a range of writers and speakers to contribute to a series drawing upon Russell Kirk’s work on the American Revolution and the constitutional order it secured.

A New Introduction to the Austrian School

“After discussing Menger, the authors go on to present the ideas of subsequent major figures in the history of the Austrian school, including Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, Friedrich von Wieser, Ludwig von Mises, F.A. Hayek, Israel Kirzner, and Murray Rothbard.”

After Mansfield

“In his most recent work… Mansfield presents a rich and nuanced portrait of the development of modern political thought.”

How Charlotte Brontë Became Charlotte Brontë

“Graham Watson’s biography of Charlotte is a judiciously researched and well-written overview of the final years of Charlotte’s life… readers will learn just how central Charlotte was to the literary establishment that both praised and scorned her.”

The Genius of T. S. Eliot

TO THE POINT: THURSDAY, JANUARY 14, 1965The gentleman and scholar who shyly dominated the republic of letters in Britain and America—Mr. T. S. Eliot—died a few days ago. Though we met only occasionally, sometimes in London and once in Edinburgh, there subsisted...

Finding Freedom in a Totalitarian Age

Eumeswil. By Ernst Jünger. Translated by Joachim Neugroschel. Introduction by Russell A. Berman. Telos Press, 2015. Paperback, 330 pages, $27. Ernst Jünger (1895–1998) was twentieth-century Germany’s most prolific writer. Throughout his long career he wrote novels,...

A New Look at Benjamin Disraeli

Disraeli: The Novel Politician by David Cesarani. Yale University Press, 2016. Hardcover, 292 pages, $25. Reviewed by John P. Rossi Of the so-called “Victorian Giants”—William Ewart Gladstone, Lord Palmerston, Joseph Chamberlain—none have fascinated the public as much...

America’s Own Richard II

Being Nixon: A Man Divided by Evan Thomas. Random House, 2015. Hardcover, 619 pages, $35. The Nixon Effect: How Richard Nixon’s Presidency Fundamentally Changed American Politics by Douglas Schoen. Encounter Books, 2016. Hardcover, 384 pages, $27.“Even Richard Nixon...

Enlarging Emily Dickinson

A Loaded Gun: Emily Dickinson for the 21st Century by Jerome Charyn. Bellevue Literary Press, 2016. Paperback, 255 pages, $20. The first part of Jerome Charyn’s title alludes to one of Emily Dickinson’s most enigmatic and powerful poems, which begins, “My Life had...

A Novel Out of Time

Laurus by Eugene Vodolazkin. Translated by Lisa Hayden. Oneworld Publications, 2015. Cloth, 352 pages, $25. In an interview with Rod Dreher, Eugene Vodalazkin, author of the novel Laurus, says that he wanted to write about something good. In the same interview he...

On Looking for What We Have Been Given

“Giving one Catholicity, God deprives one of the pleasure of looking for it but here again He has shown His mercy for such a one as myself … who, if it had not been given, would not have looked.” —Flannery O’Connor, September 24, 1947, from A Prayer Journal (2013)A...

The Many Dimensions of Charles Williams

Charles Williams: The Third Inkling by Grevel Lindop. Oxford University Press, 2015. Cloth, xx + 493 pp., $35.Acclaimed in his day by the likes of W. H. Auden, T. S. Eliot, C. S. Lewis, and Dorothy L. Sayers, Charles Williams (1886–1945) suffered a...

On Play and Seriousness

Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture by Johan Huizinga. Beacon, 1950.“We must emphasize once again that play does not exclude seriousness.” —Johan Huizinga, Homo Ludens, 1938. The classical Latin adjectives that we see associated with the Latin noun...

The Book Gallery

A collection of conversations with Bookman editor Luke C. Sheahan and writers and authors of imagination and erudition. Click on the icon in the upper right corner of the video to see more episodes in this series or check out our YouTube page.

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