The University Bookman

Reviewing Books that Build Culture

Join friends of the Bookman in New York City on December 8, 2025 for the Gerald Russello Memorial Lecture.

William F. Buckley Jr.: Literary Figure 

“…the American public intellectual might best be appreciated as a literary figure. Producing about 350,000 words for publication yearly at the peak of his career, Buckley was never at a loss for what to say or how to say it.”

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.”

Natural Law and the Need for Moral Clarity

“Christians need clarity on the way their faith shapes their political activity. This ambiguous book fails to provide that clarity.”

Moral Realism Over and Against Contingent Pluralism 

“The challenge for… all natural law theorists is the proper ordering and integration of the contingencies of a given culture and the universality of the primary precepts of natural law.”

History on Improper Principles

“The condescending attitude—even animus—behind this book is, in fact, among the reasons Trump came to power in the first place. Voters, clearly sick of being sneered at by elites like Lichtman and his colleagues in the established commentariat, have turned to populism as an outlet for their frustrations.”

New Solzhenitsyn Edition

The Kirk Center knows of few better friends or champions of the moral imagination in humane letters than Edward E. Ericson Jr., Emeritus Professor of English at Calvin College. A distinguished authority on the life and works of the Russian man of letters Aleksandr...

Review of the new edition of Kirk on Eliot

James Matthew Wilson reviews the new edition of Eliot and His Age by Russell Kirk for First Principles, the ISI web journal. Kirk considered this among his best books, and we are grateful for so sympathetic a review.

The Predicament of the Individual

An interview with James Poulos, editor of the Postmodern Conservative blog.The University Bookman is pleased to present this exclusive interview with James Poulos, doctoral candidate in political theory at Georgetown University and founding editor of the blog...

The Freedom to Use Common Sense

An interview with Philip K. Howard, author of Life without LawyersThe University Bookman is pleased to present this interview with Philip K. Howard, Vice-Chairman of the law firm of Covington & Burling LLP and Founder and Chair of Common Good, a non-profit...

Kirk in Time and Newsweek

Russell Kirk has been invoked recently in both Time and Newsweek—briefly in Joe Scarboroough's article on strategies for the Republican Party in Time,and more extensively in Jon Meacham's article, “A Modest Case for a Burkean Boomlet” in Newsweek.

Forgotten Founders

University Bookman editor Gerald J. Russello reviews biographies of Gouverneur Morris and Luther Martin, from the new ISI series on “forgotten founders” of the United States in an online exclusive.

Forgotten Constitutional Founders

An Incautious Man: The Life of Gouverneur Morris by Melanie Miller (ISI Books 2008, $25.00). Forgotten Founder, Drunken Prophet: The Life of Luther Martin by Bill Kauffman (ISI Books 2008, $25.00). Even after more than two centuries, the story of the Constitution...

Marshall McLuhan: Postmodern Grammarian

The Classical Trivium: The Place of Thomas Nashe in the Learning of His Time by Marshall McLuhan Edited by W. Terrence Gordon Gingko Press (Corte Madera, Calif.) 356 pp., $39.96 Cloth, 2005. The Medium and the Light: Reflections on Religion by Marshall McLuhan. Edited...

Kirk Video Companion Site

On this, the fifteenth anniversary of the death of Russell Kirk, April 29, we would like to announce the posting of a link to a companion website that features video interviews with scholars, prominent persons in the conservative movement, and with Russell Kirk...

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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