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.”

Sketches of Painterly Lives

Sketches of Painterly Lives

The Art of the Art BiographyRecently I met up with an agent to discuss my next book. What about writing a biography of an artist?, he suggested. What about the research?, I responded. As an editor and art critic for a monthly magazine, I just couldn’t see clearing my...

The Man Who Built Ireland

The Man Who Built Ireland

Kevin O’Higgins: Builder of the Irish State by John P. McCarthy. Irish Academic Press (Portland, Ore.), xvi/312 pp., $35.00 cloth, 2006 The subtitle of John P. McCarthy’s new biography of Kevin O’Higgins, “builder of the Irish state,” seems, at first glance, to...

An Architect for all Purposes

An Architect for all Purposes

Ralph Adams Cram: An Architect’s Four Quests: Medieval, Modernist, American, Ecumenical by Douglass Shand-Tucci. University of Massachusetts Press (Amherst), 624 pp., $49.95 cloth, 2005Ralph Adams Cram was a man of such prodigious talents that even two volumes of...

Fromthe Nightstand of a Bookman . . .

University Bookman contributor Bruce Frohnen recommends the following biographies: Robert A. Caro, The Years of Lyndon Johnson. With three volumes out and one more to come, this masterful dissection of the corruptions of power should be a warning to all fans of the...

The State of Biography

“You’ve got to be a bit ruthless, I think, to write a biography.” —Peter Cameron, The City of Your Final Destination “. . . be versatile, cunning, and ruthless in his pursuit—in other words, have all the attributes of a good spy.” —Erika Ostrovsky, Eye of Dawn: The...

The Lives of Others

The Lives of Others

“A common soldier, a child, a girl at the door of an inn, have changed the face of fortune, and almost of Nature.” These words of Edmund Burke, which Russell Kirk often invoked, bring home to us, in a set of striking images and historical allusions (the girl is Joan...

New Bookman

New Bookman

The new Spring issue of the University Bookman is out and the full contents are posted on our site. The issue is devoted to the art of biography with reviews of new books on Ralph Adams Cram (by Dan McCarthy), Orestes Brownson, conservative luminary Gerhart Niemeyer,...

Kirk Audio: Two Revolutions

We have posted a 50-minute audio lecture from 1990 with Dr. Kirk speaking on Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France and related themes.

Kirk Audio: Rights Under Two Revolutions

Russell Kirk speaks on the French and American Revolutions in this 1990 audio recording.Recorded June 1, 1990, “Rights under Two Revolutions” is an almost 50-minute discussion comparing the French Revolution and the American struggle for rights under English law that...

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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