Reasons to Believe
The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief by Francis S. Collins Free Press (New York) 304 pp., $26.00 cloth, 2006 Few things cause more excitement among American evangelicals than the discovery that a well-known actor, athlete, or entertainer is a...
History’s Story
A History of Histories: Epics, Chronicles, Romances and Inquiries from Herodotus and Thucydides to the Twentieth Century by John Burrow Random House (New York) 540 pp., $35.00 cloth, 2007 The past may be another country, as a cliché holds, but it nonetheless remains...
America’s Image Abroad
Why America is Such a Hard Sell: Beyond Pride and Prejudice by Juliana Geran Pilon Rowman & Littlefield (Lanham, Md.) 280 pp., $26.95 paper, 2007 The question that Juliana Geran Pilon asks in Why America Is Such a Hard Sell is not at all rhetorical. We are the...
Acton in Italy
Lord Acton, Il Liberalismo Etico Edited By Massimo Baldini. Armando Editore (Rome) 125 pp., $18.53 paper, 2006For several months now Italian bookshops have been selling a priceless collection of the thoughts and sayings of one of the greatest “Catholic Liberals” of...
Alasdair Macintyre: Philosopher of the Ages
Books by Alasdair MacIntyre: Edith Stein: A Philosophical Prologue, 1913-1922 Rowman & Littlefield (Lanham, Md.) 208 pp., $33.00 cloth, 2005 The Tasks of Philosophy: Selected Essays, Vol. 1 Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, U.K.) 244 pp., $70.00 cloth, 2006...The Prince Redeemed
The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington by Robert Novak. Crown Forum (New York) 662 pp., $29.95 cloth, 2007 If Hollywood is home to “kiss and tell” memoirs, should Washington be the source of the “kiss up and tell” variety? Not if you’re the...Rhyming the Right
The Conservative Poets: A Contemporary Anthology Edited by William Baer. University of Evansville Press (Evansville, Ind.) 182 pp., $20.00 cloth, 2006.When you put fifteen important poets (most of them teachers and prolific publishers of poetry, prose, and criticism)...The Non-Human World of China Miéville
Although I do not particularly admire the criticism of Harold Bloom, his Freudian theory that ambitious authors want to “kill” their strong literary predecessors is getting a lot of empirical support these days from British fantasy writers, first from Phillip Pullman,...Farewells and Looking Ahead
By the time this issue reaches our subscribers, the nation will have chosen its two contending nominees for President. Unfortunately, the current candidates do not seem to have taken to heart the advice suggested by Christopher Layne, whose book, No More Illusions, is...
There are metaphorical hills on which I would be willing to die. The Oxford comma is one of them.
So easy to forget that the best way to educate yourself is to read great works of literature and philosophy, then talk about them. Bring back the salon!