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G. K. Chesterton: A Biography
Ian Ker
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Description for G. K. Chesterton: A Biography
Paperback. This full-length life of G. K. Chesterton is the first comprehensive biography of both the man and the writer. It draws on many unpublished letters and papers to evoke Chesterton's joyful humour, his humility and affinity to the common man, and his love of the ordinary things of life. Num Pages: 784 pages, 17 black and white images. BIC Classification: 2AB; DN; DSBH. Category: (P) Professional & Vocational; (U) Tertiary Education (US: College). Dimension: 232 x 154 x 44. Weight in Grams: 1158.
G. K. Chesterton is remembered as a brilliant creator of nonsense and satirical verse, author of the Father Brown stories and the innovative novel, The Man who was Thursday, and yet today he is not counted among the major English novelists and poets. However, this major new biography argues that Chesterton should be seen as the successor of the great Victorian prose writers, Carlyle, Arnold, Ruskin, and above all Newman. Chesterton's achievement as one of the great English literary critics has not hitherto been fully recognized, perhaps because his best literary criticism is of prose rather than poetry. ... Read moreIan Ker remedies this neglect, paying particular attention to Chesterton's writings on the Victorians, especially Dickens. As a social and political thinker, Chesterton is contrasted here with contemporary intellectuals like Bernard Shaw and H. G. Wells in his championing of democracy and the masses. Pre-eminently a controversialist, as revealed in his prolific journalistic output, he became a formidable apologist for Christianity and Catholicism, as well as a powerful satirist of anti-Catholicism. This full-length life of G. K. Chesterton is the first comprehensive biography of both the man and the writer. It draws on many unpublished letters and papers to evoke Chesterton's joyful humour, his humility and affinity to the common man, and his love of the ordinary things of life. Show Less
Product Details
Publisher
Oxford University Press United Kingdom
Place of Publication
Oxford, United Kingdom
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Reviews for G. K. Chesterton: A Biography
Ian Kers magisterial new biographical of Chesterto nwill now do for Chesterton what his definitive biography of Newman did for hima major literary achievement. Nobody who has any interest in Chesterton can afford to be without Ian Kers book
William Oddie, The Catholic Herald
This masterly biography has the potential to help establish Chesterton in what Ker regards ... Read moreas his rightful place as a major English author
Susan Elkin, The Independent on Sunday24/04/2011
Ian Kers tremendous biography is an incitement to read Chesterton a fresh[it] confirms him as a great thinker
Christopher Howse, The Tablet
A discriminating portrait that does welcome justice to the full richness of [Chestertons] hitherto undervalued work the need for a proper critical biography has long been acknowledged and Ker has supplied itfor any true understanding of the scope of Chestertons achievement Kers biography will be indispensable.
Edward Short, The Weekly Standard
A brilliant towering biography
Gary Day, The Times Higher Educational Supplement
Chesterton finally gets the big book he deserves a monumental study
Gerald J. Russello, The National Catholic Register
Heroically researched.. an impressive book that conveys a powerful sense of [Chestertons] personality
Dj Taylor, The Independent
magisterial a splendid book
James E. Peson Jr., Touchstone
This full-length scholarly biography will be indispensable for decades
Richard Harries, The Church Times
Professor Ker's spirited and double-barreled attempt at a rehabilitation of his cherished subject is enjoyable in its own right, and takes in such matters as Chesterton's dialectical genius for paradox, the authority of the Father Brown stories in the detective genre, and the salience of Charles Dickens in the English canonical one
Christopher Hitchens, The Atlantic
Magnificent
Irish Catholic
Detailed and compelling
Chronicle of Higher Education
... comprehensive biolography ...
The Lutheran
Spirited and ... enjoyable
The Atlantic
[This] terrific new biography.... gives us a portrait of the man in the full.... Any biography of this size is bound to have some elements of dry, encyclopedic chronology; but in Ker's book, they are far more the exception than the rule. On just about every page, one will find extended quotes from Chesterton, of the kind that display his personality and overall joie de vivre. The author made me rediscover my early love of Chesterton and his perspective on the world, and for that I am deeply grateful
Michael Potemra, National Review Online
Ian Ker provides an account of the thought of Chesterton that surpasses, in its comprehensiveness, anything that has been previously written about him
Bernard Manzo, Times Literary Supplement
Handles a complex subject with admirable lucidity. Mastering Chesterton's output is a heroic feat in itself
Peter Washington, Literary Review
Full of colossal wit, wisdom, and common sense...that is this magnificent book
Catholic Times
There are many fine things in Kers biography. Surely the best is found in his constant stress on the link between the comic and the serious in Chesterton.
Ralph C Wood, Seven
This is a brilliant biography for a brilliant man.
Times Higher Education
Rewarding biography
Tribune
Superb...absorbing
Piers Paul Read, Standpoint
Reveals valuable new information
The Times
Magisterial
Matthew D'Ancona, Sunday Telegraph
[A] masterful biography. Ker... has now become the most important source we have for understanding the master of paradox [Chesterton]... Ker's biography is essential, a labor of love to be sure
America
A big man, physically and intellectually, British Catholic author Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) finally gets the big book he deserves.... a monumental study
National Catholic Register
Ker is supremely capable of locating Chesterton's thought amid that of his contemporaries as well as evaluating it critically. . . . What his biography adds is a judicious critical eye that will help make the case that Chesterton is bigger than the keepers of culture have allowed
National Review
There are some genuinely good books on Chesterton. . . But the need for a proper critical biography has long been acknowledged, and Ker has supplied it. Now, and for the foreseeable future, for any true understanding of the scope of G.K. Chesterton's achievement, which captures not only the sage but the good, gentle, generous man, Ker's biography will be indispensable.
The Weekly Standard
For the sheer life-affirming, joyful Chesterton constantly bursts through the relentless narrative and there is much to discover as well as much to enjoy in the corpulence of this book
Recusant History
Ker's biography is indispensable for anyone who admires Chesterton's work and is interested in his life.
Commonweal
This biography is a necessity for any student of Chesterton
Towers
Ker has produced one of those rare biographies that is full of detailed information and personal anecdotes while never losing the author's original goal. We cannot recommend this volume too highly
The Master's Seminary Journal
Make the case that Chesterton is bigger than the keepers of culture have allowed
National Review
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