Dr. Seuss & How the Secular Humanist Stole Christmas
It is telling when the deficiencies of the adult world are told in the pages of children’s books. An instance…
The Tailor of Gloucester by Beatrix Potter
Christmastime is the homiest holiday: firesides, feasting, family… and fairy folk. The richest Christmas traditions concern down-to-earth things; which only…
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Ignorance and Want: “…no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade… has monsters half so horrible and dread.” Leave…
The Great American Sex Fantasy
I got the idea for this fantasy from a dear and respectable gentleman who is a college professor, like myself….
“The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry: The Wise Fools of Christmas
Christmas is coming, the geese are getting fat. Please put a penny in the old man’s hat. As Christmas carols…
The Canterville Ghost by Oscar Wilde
There is nothing like a good ghost story. The forms of fiction are few that can compete with the proverbial dark…
Coincidentally: A Cornucopia of Pharmacopoeia
The Scots are famously reserved in their habits and modest demeanor, but this has not restrained their substantial claim to…
Coincidentally: A Nation Mourns
Adolf Frederick V, grand duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, was born during the presidency of James Knox Polk, who was born in…
J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings: Handbook of Hope
by Emma Warner
“Where there’s life there’s hope, as my Gaffer used to say; and need of vittles, as he mostways used to add.”…
The Devilment and Duels of Life
Fyodor Dostoevsky was condemned to death—public execution by firing squad. The year was 1849 and the young Dostoevsky, fresh from…
Coincidentally: “Ebonics” for the new Mass
In 1996, the school board of Oakland, California, caused a stir by wanting to teach a dialect of English as…
Coincidentally: Old Boney
A reflection of Mark Twain abides: “How often we recall with regret that Napoleon once shot at a magazine editor…
The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan: The Importance of the Impossible
If all literature were based upon plausibility and credibility, there would be no such thing as fiction. Imagination is a deterrent…
The Chesterton Society Reading Group
Join us this December 18th, 8:00 PM, at Mercy Hall for the inaugural meeting of the Chesterton Society of the…
Coincidentally: Medicine on the March
Among the benefactions of gruel wars has been the promotion of medical science. The Hyksos invasion of Egypt advertised the…
The Tale of Mrs. Tittlemouse by Beatrix Potter
If there is anything pleasant in life, it is doing what we aren’t meant to do. If there is anything…
Homesick at Home: A Chestertonian Thanksgiving
“Frances! Come here! Come here at once!” Frances Chesterton started and flew from her half-prepared afternoon tea to the study…
Thanksgiving and the Tall Tale
“Thanksgiving Day. Let all give humble, hearty, and sincere thanks, now, but the turkeys.” ~ Mark Twain, Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar…
Guilt Gone Wilde: The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
If Oscar Wilde had been a man of our time, he might have had rather mixed feelings about the LGBT liberation…
