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.”

After the Republic: Tacitus on the End of a Free State

“…you don’t really have to ‘wonder’ if you’ve lost the republic… This is one of the lessons of the first few paragraphs of Tacitus’ Annals. In this dour, grumpy review of the first decades of the Roman Empire, Tacitus gives us seven signs that the republic is well and truly dead.”

Why Cervantes’ Don Quixote Matters

Don Quixote makes life the protagonist. The affirmation of life is truly Don Quixote’s quest. The venerable knight-errant seeks more than life from his life.”

After Ideology but Before the Revolution: The Liberal Soul

“Walsh could give voice to a devastating criticism of the critics of liberal democracy because they forgot the most important aspect of what they chopped to pieces: there can be no analysis of liberal democracy outside the convictions that underpin it, namely mutual respect for the dignity and rights of others. There is no higher purpose possible than the affirmation of the infinite worth of each human being, of each ‘person,’ and the political consequences of that affirmation: to build that insight into the regimes of self-government.”

Against the New Deal

Against the New Deal

“…editor Shlaes, biographer of Calvin Coolidge and historian of both the Great Depression and the New Deal, refuses to pull any punches. Yes, the New Deal ‘failed,’ but then ‘so did its critics.’” 

Correcting the Historical Record on Slavery

Correcting the Historical Record on Slavery

“Slavery, in fact, was everywhere for the vast majority of human history, and it still survives in places today. While Western civilization deserves credit for helping end it, the Catholic Church stands alone in both its early recognition and its consistent conviction that slavery is evil.”

History of the American Revolution Well Told

History of the American Revolution Well Told

“This new edition of a book on one of the most important subjects in American diplomatic history by one of the leading practitioners in the field should remind readers how important—and downright fascinating—such works can be.”

Virtue in the Age of Neo-Machiavellianism

Virtue in the Age of Neo-Machiavellianism

“For Hankins the notion of a new nobility based upon merit—not class or blood, on one hand, nor ‘equity,’ on the other—is one of Patrizi’s most important messages for America today. Hankins, throughout the book, presents the optimistic case that such a vision of a virtuous, meritocratic Republic is the way forward for America.”

Crafting a New Evangelical Imagination

Crafting a New Evangelical Imagination

“The result of a Christian subculture so deeply infused with Victorian era sentimentalism is that evangelicalism became less an intellectual theological system and more ‘a religion of the heart.'”

Rising with the Saints

Rising with the Saints

“…the Church will come alive again when we become committed to being radical in the ordinary things: prayer, devotion, sacrifice, charity, and the study of the truth.”

Thinking as a Human Being

Thinking as a Human Being

“…the world we are involved in is cognitively sorted by us according to the purposes and concerns of our form of life, which is in turn… shaped by the structures, traditions and worldviews in which we bodily participate. This poses a major challenge for AI…”

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.

It may be tottering in the hands of a succession of immoral geriatrics, we might be horrified at the incompetents we keep choosing to vote for, and we might be increasingly ignorant that how something is done is as important for republican freedom as what is done.

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