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.

The Audacious Russell Kirk

“Neither Eliot nor Kirk would justify surrender in the face of conflict, especially when order in the commonwealth is at stake.”

The Imaginative Russell Kirk

“Michael Lucchese has gathered 17 essays in which Kirk discusses not only the Founding, but also the nation that the Revolution created, the distinctive nature of the people who imagined and developed it, and the traditions they inherited and adapted.”

Remembering Robert Fagles: From Suffering to Meaning

“[Fagles] took as the essence of tragedy Aeschylus’s phrase ‘pathei mathos,’ ‘learning via suffering,’ which contained in it the belief that we could reap a harvest of knowledge from the pain.”

Morality in Adam Smith

Morality in Adam Smith

“Liberty in the Smithian sense was not exercised by utility-maximizing atoms but by relational creatures in community. Klein… shows that the advent of Smith-inspired liberal political economy was grounded in natural jurisprudence and moral philosophy.”

The Personal Foundation of Reality

The Personal Foundation of Reality

“…the source of reality itself must be personal in some way. As Rasmussen puts it: ‘A big thesis, then, that emerges from my inquiry is this: reality is deeply personal…”

A Cure For Boredom

A Cure For Boredom

“Kevin Hood Gary’s book… is an important contribution to the Aristotelian tradition, which emphasizes the importance of how human beings use their free time.”

Communism: Product of the Fallen West

Communism: Product of the Fallen West

“The reason the Western world should fear Communism, according to Sheen, is not because it is a strong force but rather because the West is weak due to the fact that it has turned away from God and morality.”

Choosing a Currency

Choosing a Currency

“…White succeeds in presenting the complexity of money and its purpose in a way that is both informative and friendly to the general reader.”

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.

Decades ago, Robert Nisbet anticipated many of today’s concerns about loneliness, bureaucracy, and declining community. Luke C. Sheahan (@lsheahan) revisits the ideas behind those warnings and their relevance today.

Questions about first principles have become fashionable again. @HorcherF and @DanJTPitt apply generosity to smooth contention between intellectuals and politicians, they embrace the tension between theory and practice, and they highlight the power of particularity as a source of

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