The University Bookman
Reviewing Books that Build Culture

From New York to Chartres with La Farge
Stephen Schmalhofer looks at the life and connections of the Catholic artist John La Farge, the friend and tutor of the historian Henry Adams.

More Than Mildly Amusing
Elizabeth Bittner welcomes Mr. Mehan’s entertaining—and substantive—animal alphabet.

What Makes the Midwest Midwestern?
Jonathan Kasparek reviews a new collection on the cultural history of the Midwest.

Fear Your Toaster
Michael J. Ard reviews a disturbing book on the vulnerabilities of our Internet-connected lives.

Ideology Unbounded in San Francisco
Matthew Stokes reviews Daniel J. Flynn’s revealing history of the ideological and other connections between Jim Jones and Harvey Milk.

The Rise of Black Intellectual History
Chidike Okeem reviews a collection on the black intellectual tradition.

Pondering the Defeatists
Richard Cocks reviews a new edition of Colin Wilson’s Age of Defeat and explores the ongoing production line of nihilistic fiction.

Hibernian Pastoral
Chris R. Morgan reviews Michael Brendan Dougherty’s contribution to the genre of the “pop jeremiad.”

A Gimlet Eye Beneath a Chapel Veil
Eve Tushnet reviews two “institutional novels” as she reintroduces us to the poignant work of Antonia White.
The Book Gallery
A collection of conversations with Bookman editor Luke C. Sheahan and writers and authors of imagination and erudition.