The University Bookman

Reviewing Books that Build Culture

Watch James Panero of the New Criterion discuss “The Urbanity of Russell Kirk” at the 2025 Gerald Russello Memorial Lecture.

The Urbanity of Russell Kirk

“The urban fabric must also be mended and darned through continuous upkeep. The city is not yours to experiment. From Russell to Russello, our ancestral spirits cast their shadows whether or not we choose to observe the city of god in the cities of men.”

Words from the Hearth

“Each poem maps a path on the journey by sharing the personal and religious experiences of a young woman falling in love, getting married, and then expecting and welcoming children. As a reader who tends to prefer prose to poetry, I appreciate the narrative arc as well as the opportunity to reminisce, through Reardon’s work, on my own similar experiences. Reardon’s writing is intensely religious, elevating the seemingly mundane aspects of home life to a spiritual level. Because it draws such powerful connections, it invites readers to ponder how even the simplest details of their lives can lead to the divine.”

A Knight of the American West

“His new book is an exciting chivalric adventure and romance, while also being a contemporary American novel set in the Southwest USA. Exceptionally well written, its straightforward crafting is an encouragement to the reader who eagerly returns to its pages.”

Coming to Terms with Sherman

“…Glenn Arbery has contemporary America down cold, the more so since the cultural variations between North and South are far from being as marked as they were even fifty years ago.”

A Gentleman Out of Moscow

A Gentleman Out of Moscow

“Maddocks is an able guide as she wanders through the adventures, disappointments, and adjustments that Rachmaninoff would experience from his escape in 1917 to his death in 1943.”

To Recover Is to Return

To Recover Is to Return

“The decline [Esolen] has diagnosed is not merely a shift in cultural tastes or even a change in values; it is a near total loss of what it means to be human.

Claiming the Classical Tradition

Claiming the Classical Tradition

“The book stands as a powerful argument that the Classical Tradition has been essential to the lived Black experience in the United States for four centuries. And consequently, the book asserts that any attempts to deny such a connection severs Black Americans from a heritage to which they owe much and from which they will find a treasure trove of wisdom.”

The Geography of the Peace at Eighty

The Geography of the Peace at Eighty

“…Spykman’s book was meant to educate American policymakers and citizens on the permanent geopolitical factors that should guide U.S. foreign policy into the future. Some of Spykman’s ideas resonate in 2024.”

Russell Kirk and Japan: Enamored by the Dead

Russell Kirk and Japan: Enamored by the Dead

“Kirk’s multifaceted persona, blending serious conservative thought with a penchant for the mysterious, underscores the complexity of his intellectual legacy, which I continue to try to unravel even today.”

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.

@EvieSolheim By the way, the @KirkCenter takes literature, ethics, character formation, & cultural renewal seriously

Encourage you to participate in our @ubookman academic journal & the fellowship of our literary & academic community, enshrining what Dr. Kirk calls “the Moral Imagination”

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