G. K. Chesterton
A Guide to Resources in Mount Angel Abbey Library

Gilbert Keith (G.K.) Chesterton (1874-1936) was an English writer, literary critic and author of the Father Brown detective stories. He was born in London and educated at St. Paul's School before studying art at the Slade. But art was always secondary to letters. He wrote regular articles for many newspapers and magazines, took over the New Witness on the death of his brother, Cecil, in 1918 and revived it as G.K.'s Weekly in 1924. He was a man of much geniality but he had a strong antipathy for the squalor of industrialism and disliked both capitalism and socialism, yearning, like his great friend Hilaire Belloc (whose books he amusingly illustrated), for a return to the distributivist economics of the Middle Ages. He sought to undermine secularism with an apologia that took religion as the guide and goal of all thought and action. He found sanity and creativity in a God-centered, not man-centered, universe; in an informed heart, not in rationalism or irrationalism. His 111 books (with about a dozen pamphlets) including essays, poetry, novels, and literary, social and religious studies (he was converted to Roman Catholicism in 1922), reveal his tremendous energy, robust humor and mastery of paradox.

• Sprug, Joseph W. An Index to G.K. Chesterton. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1966. (PR 4453 C4 Z76)
• Sullivan, John. G.K. Chesterton: A Bibliography. 1958; Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1974. Includes an essay, "On books" by G. K. Chesterton and an epitaph by Walter de la Mare. (PR 4453 C4 Z5 S81)
• Sullivan, John. Chesterton Continued: A Bibliographical Supplement. New York: Barnes & Noble, Inc., 1969. Includes some uncollected prose and verse by Chesterton. (PR 4453 C4 Z5 S82)

This is a relatively small sampling of what is available:

• Novels:
  • The Man Who Was Thursday
  • The Ball and the Cross
  • The Return of Don Quixote
• Short Fiction and Poetry:
  • the Father Brown stories
  • The Queen of Seven Swords, Wine, Water and Song

  . collections of poems

• Nonfiction:
  • Orthodoxy
  • What's Wrong With the World
  • St. Thomas Aquinas
  • Charles Dickens
  • Where all Roads Lead, The Spice of Life. collections of essays.
• The Autobiography of G. K. Chesterton. New York: Sheed and Ward, Inc., 1936. (PR 4453 C4 A8)
• The Collected Works of G.K. Chesterton.. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986. Many volumes. (PR 4453 C4)
• G.K.'s Weekly, a Sampler. Ed. Lyle W. Dorsett. Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1986. Thirty issues of the journal published by Chesterton from 1925 to 1936. (PR 4453 C4 A16 M36)
• The Man Who Was Orthodox : a Selection from the Uncollected Writings of G.K. Chesterton. arranged and introduced by A.L. Maycock. New York: Sheed and Ward, Inc., 1936. (PR 4453 C4 A16 M36)

• Conlon, D.J. G.K. Chesterton: a Half Century of Views. New York: Paragon, 1990. (PR 4453 C4 Z64625)
• Coren, Michael. Gilbert, the Man Who Was G.K. Chesterton. New York: Oxford UP, 1987. (PR 4453 C4 Z5 C6)
• Dale, Alzina Stone. The Outline of Sanity: a Biography of G.K. Chesterton. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982. (PR 4453 C4 Z588)
• Ffinch, Michael. G. K. Chesterton. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987. (PR 4453 C4 Z63)
• Kenner, Hugh. Paradox in Chesterton. New York: Sheed and Ward, 1947. (PR 4453 C4 Z5 K4)
• Lauer, Quentin. G. K. Chesterton: Philosopher Without Portfolio, 1943. (PR 4453 C4 Z5 L38)
• Ward, Maisie. Gilbert Keith Chesterton. New York: Sheed and Ward, 1943. (PR 4453 C4 Z5 W32)
• Wills, Garry. Chesterton, Man and Mask. New York: Sheed and Ward, 1961. (PR 4453 C4 Z5 W5)

• Blackstock, Alan. "Redeeming the fallen giants : Chesterton on Newman, Carlyle, and Ruskin." Religion & Literature :36(2): 25-49.
• Boyd, Ian. "Finding a Safe Place." Canadian Catholic Review 12: 9-10 (Feb. 1994)
• Body, Ian. "No Limits for GKC." Tablet 249: 1252-1254 (Sept 30 1995)
• Elkink, Deb. "Genius with a Message." Christian History 21(3):23
• Elshtain, Jean Bethke. "G.K. Chesterton, a Curmudgeon for our Time." New Oxford Review 61: 16-17 (Mar 1994)
• Hitchcock, James. "Apologists -- With Angst and Without." Crisis 14: 34-38 (March 1996)
• Isley, William L. "Knowledge and Mystery in Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday." Christianity and Literature 42: 279-294 (Winter 1993)
• Myers, Rawley. "The Great GKC." Homiletic and Pastoral Review 95: 70-72 (Aug-Sept 1995)
• Zaleski, Carol "Generation GK." Christian Century 118(21): 30

The Chesterton Review, located with the other journals on the top floor at the north end of the library.

There is a home page for the American Chesterton Society (www.chesterton.org), whose mission is to "extend the influence of G.K. Chesterton by promoting an interest in his writings, primarily among a new generation of readers unfamiliar with the man and his work."

Last updated November 2004