Review of Russell Kirk, Ancestral Shadows: An Anthology of Ghostly Tales, ed. by Vigen Guroian In the early 1970s, Barbara Elliott, now an acclaimed Catholic lecturer and writer (Candles Behind the Wall; Street Saints), encountered the Other World in the ancestral home of Dr. Russell Kirk. In the middle of the night, a figure whispered to [...]
My talk today is about death, love, mystery, and myth. G.K. Chesterton wrote some of most stirring words of the past century in his “Ballad of the White Horse.” The Men of the East may search the scrolls, For sure fates and fame, But the men that drink the blood of God Go Singing to [...]
In the beginning of the stunning novel, O Pioneers, Willa Cather describes a small, frontier town on the Great Plains. “One January day, thirty years ago, the little town of Hanover, anchored on a windy Nebraska tableland, was trying not to be blown away. A mist of fine snowflakes was curling and eddying about the cluster [...]
The following 1950 quote from Russell Kirk [“How Dead is Edmund Burke?,” Queen’s Quarterly 57 (1950): 162] made me think of our recent conversation on the power of Ayn Rand to attract strong, young minds, eager for Truth. Men of conservative impulse are numerous in every society; they are among us today, but most of [...]
As I was “calling it a day” last night, my good friend, Carl, over at Ignatius Insight Scoop, posted a note about Dinesh D’souza and his assumption of the presidency of The King’s College. Before I write anything more, I must admit two things. First, I’ve not kept up with D’Souza’s career in the last [...]
My morning tip of the day: never, ever try to walk up slick wooden stairs with a cup of coffee and a MacBook in one hand and a book in the other. My guess is that I’m not the first to learn such a lesson. I might be, however, the first to learn such a [...]
(Part I link) What finally made me question Rand, though, was an essay she wrote on why an Objectivist would be pro-choice on the abortion issue. For whatever reason, this hit me as absurd and hypocritical on her part. It seemed (and still does) to contradict the best of what she believed and promoted. Again, [...]
National Review’s cover featured a very captivating art-deco style rendering of Ayn Rand. Whether intentional or not (and most likely it is), the portrait divides Rand’s face in manichaen fashion, half light, half dark. Though the article, “Ayn Rand Reconsidered: A Greatness Stunted by Hate,” by Jason Steorts, is relatively short, it packs a serious [...]
Erik Prince Please forgive the brevity of this “With Both Barrels.” It’s the weekend. I wasn’t planning on posting, but Dedra is still drinking coffee, the kids are cleaning (whoo-hoo!), and it’s a grey, rainy day outside. Not good weather for the last Saturday of the summer. But, hey, enough about the Birzer [...]
For Catholics, the iPad just became a bit holier. Yesterday, Jorge Panayotti released “St. Josemaria for iPad” ($14.99). A part of EB Solutions’s “Catholic Applications,” the St. Josemaria app is quite beautiful and useful. This app includes The Way, Furrow, The Forge, Christ is Passing By, and, my favorite, Friends of God. A number of [...]
Take me back to Constantinople No, you can’t go back to Constantinople Now it’s Istanbul, not Constantinople Why did Constantinople get the works? That’s nobody’s business but the Turks’ Interestingly enough, we band of conservatives here at The Imaginative Conservative have spent only the smallest amount of time addressing the current raging controversy regarding the [...]
Highly recommended for those who can stomach it: Jim Otteson's post at Pileus. Books on the topic of this essay may be found in The Imaginative Conservative Bookstore. The Imaginative Conservative applies the principle of appreciation to the discussion of culture and politics—we approach dialogue with magnanimity rather than with mere civility. Will you help us remain [...]
Ludwig von Mises Mixed news coming from the Big Apple this morning. Though the Yankees handily defeated the Tigers, the New York Times reports that Catholic Archbishop Dolan of New York, while speaking at a homeless shelter, defended the Islamic building of a mosque near the former WTC. “Archbishop Dolan invoked the example [...]
CLASS OF 2014 I’ll never forget the time an older friend (fifteen years older) teased me about not knowing what “CC” meant on a letter. For me, “CC” was cross country or closed captioning. From what I remember, my trusty MacWrite in high and college didn’t have such a function. Carbon Copy? Sounds like a [...]