February

My second month of reading Chesterton has introduced me to his journalistic essays: I read 'Twelve Types' and started 'All things considered'. Though they are interesting, I sometimes struggle with these pieces: sometimes they presuppose some background knowledge that I lack.
I did not read as much as I was planning: though I started 'Heretics', I am only in the beginning of the book. I did read 'The man who was Thursday', however, and enjoyed it very much. When I started reading, I soon became fascinated by the undercover story. Then, nearing the end, I became very much puzzled. Now, ruminating over the story I read some days ago, I become more and more impressed. It is definitely a book that I will return to some time.
After finishing the first 'Father Brown' bundle last month, and starting the second one last week, I just began watching the series today. At first sight, I am not overly impressed. Though the scene is beautiful, and Father Brown was well played, the story lacks some speed when watched on television. But perhaps I just have to get used to it.

France

In 'The Defendant', Chesterton includes one essay on patriotism. The subject is discussed again in 'All things considered': Chesterton explains in 'Patriotism and sport' why England need not be overly distressed about her sportsmen: because 'the real historic strength of England, physical and moral, has never had anything to do with this athletic specialism'.
The following three essays were apparently written shortly after a journey to France. Here, one sees how much importance Chesterton gives to national characteristics. 'An essay on two cities' discusses the differences between London and Paris: in the names of the streets, in the monuments one finds. He asserts that 'London is a riddle. Paris is an explanation'.
Before one can be international, one must be national. 'International peace means a peace between nations, not a peace after the destruction of nations'. In 'French and English' various differences between English and French perceptions are discussed: their attitude to nobility, the differences in literature.
Finally, 'The Zola controversy' opens with a comparison between how the two countries honor their writers. England has barely erected a statue for Shakespeare (and not because Shakespeare is not a great writer), while France discusses giving great honors to the recently deceased Zola. The latter discussion is far more practical: there is really a question to be asked about Zola's role in literature. England, on the other hand has something 'modest and manly about not attempting to express our greatest poet in the plastic arts in which we do not excel'.
Chesterton, on his travels to France, has encountered a different culture. He realizes that one can respect, even admire, different cultures, without wanting to copy it. This is one more thing we can learn from in our time of 'cosmopolitanism'.

The man who was Thursday

I just finished Chesterton's most famous novel: a sort of detective called 'The man who was Thursday; a nightmare'. I completely enjoyed the middle part of the book, in which Syme gets to know the other members of the Council. It was a great read, with unexpected turns, but completely 'logical'. Towards the end, though, from chapter 13 on, I did not really grasp the story anymore. Chesterton's thinking may have been too deep for me at that moment; I will reread it sometime.

A nightmare?

By now, I am halfway 'The man who was Thursday', and I am enjoying it completely. The combination of discussions about anarchism and the plot in which Syme actually becomes member of an underground organization is fast paced, hilarious, and deep at the same time.

"The work of the philosophical policeman is at once bolder and more subtle than that of the ordinary detective. The ordinary detective goes to pot-houses to arrest thieves; we go to artistic tea-parties to detect pessimists. The ordinary detective discovers from a ledger or a diary that a crime has been committed. We discover from a book of sonnets that a crime will be committed. We have to trace the origin of those dreadful thoughts that drive men on at last to intellectual fanaticism and intellectual crime."

Heresies

As far as I know at this moment, Chesterton wrote three main books about Christianity: 'Heretics', followed by 'Orthodoxy', and, years later, 'The everlasting man'. After reading the last two, I decided to start this blog. 'Heretics' is, however, the first written of the three; I recently started reading in it.
My first idea is that it has the form of a collection of essays, rather than of one sweeping argument. This is natural, since there are various different 'heresies' to discuss. Chapter one, however, is more general and begins with 'introductory remarks on the importance of orthodoxy'. Chesterton explains clearly why a man's philosophy is immensely important, that opportunism fails, and that he means, in this book, to go back to fundamentals.
Chapter two is also fairly general; here the difference between negative and positive ethics is explained. In the modern world, people tend to focus on the bad effects of doing wrong. While this is, of course, not wrong in itself, there is one thing missing: a sense of what is right, a sense of positive direction. The modern thinking will 'shirk the problem of what is good', but at the same time promote 'progress'. This thought is singular, for if we do not know the direction we should go, how can we make progress in this direction?
From chapter three on, Chesterton discusses particular cases, often using specific people to explain specific 'heresies'. For example, Rudyard Kipling is used as an example of how 'exploration and enlargement make the world smaller'. Becoming more global, we fail to understand the essence of a particular locality.

Quotes

I stated before that Chesterton is 'very, very quotable'. Quotes from his books can not only be found in abundance all over the internet, they are also one of the ways people actually hear about Chesterton.
A few weeks ago, I read the following quote somewhere: "An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered." This quote actually stems from the essay 'On running after one's hat' in the bundle 'All things considered'.
The essay discusses various inconveniences, such as the recent flooding of parts of London, having to run after one's hat, and waiting for the train. For the latter case, Chesterton points out that small boys would never complain about hanging about a railway station: for him 'to be inside a railway station is to be inside a cavern of wonder and a palace of poetical pleasures'. We too, might be able to accept some inconveniences, even enjoy them.
I immensely enjoy finding quotes in their own context: usually they become more comprehensible, beautiful and even easier to remember.

Merchandise

To my surprise, there is actually 'Chesterton merchandise' around: fans of Chesterton can actually get quite some Chesterton 'objects' online. A few weeks ago, I had already noticed that zazzle.com has dozens of Chesterton items (mainly t-shirts, mugs and refrigerator magnets), most with beautiful quotes (since Chesterton is very, very quotable).
Now recently, the Chesterton Society opened its own online store, mainly featuring books (as it should, in my opinion). To my surprise, there are quite some Chesterton dvd's: not only the 'Father Brown' series and a play by Chesterton, but also five seasons of 'The apostle of common sense', a series of which I had never heard (though I did see a book with that title).
The merchandise is quite attractive; I will not, however, buy much at the moment. Before I read (and see) about Chesterton, I really want to read his own words. A nice mouse pad, as a reminder of my quest this year, might be enough for the moment.

Success

I just read a marvelous essay in 'All things considered' : 'The fallacy of success'. I wonder that in Chesterton's time, there were already 'books showing men how to succeed in everything; [-] written by men who cannot even succeed in writing books'.
Chesterton's philosophical problem with 'success' is that 'there is no such thing'. The books merely show men how to excel in their profession. But this is something interesting: how can a book that tells me nothing about my specific profession, say teaching, have anything to say about my becoming a better teacher? The general advice in these books tells me things as 'you must have a clear aim before you'. Chesterton, on the other hand, thinks that 'there are only two ways of succeeding. One is by doing very good work, the other is by cheating.'
Taking a specific example, an article about how Vanderbilt got so rich, Chesterton shows that there is nothing substantial in the advice given (which boils down to 'seize those opportunities that are given us'). The "instinct that makes people rich" the article talks about, is really nothing more than what Christianity might call "the sin of avarice". The last paragraphs of the essay discuss the myth of king Midas; the conclusion is that these books about success 'spread a sort of evil poetry of worldliness'.

Journalism

Reading a biography about Chesterton, I start to realize that he was primarily a journalist. Both 'The defendant' and 'Twelve Types' (and 'All things considered', the bundle I just started) are collections of his journalistic work. I read that Chesterton became well-known because of his writings opposing the Boer war.
Now in the bundles I read, there was up to now not one direct reference to his war (though some indirect comments can be found in 'the defence of patriotism'). Perhaps I'll find these articles later on, or perhaps they are not readily available because they may have lost their relevance (the Boer war being over long ago).
The interesting thing is that so many of Chesterton's journalistic work is still both interesting and relevant to read nowadays. I may confess that I do not know too much about all the persons Chesterton discusses in 'Twelve Types', but even I heard about most of them. The 'Defences' are timeless, and even the discussion about 'Cockney humor' in 'All things considered' has something to say to us today.
It makes one wonder how many journalistic pieces from today's newspaper are still readable in one hundred years.

Twelve Types

'Twelve types' is a collection of twelve essays about twelve persons (or rather: essays which take these persons as starting points for a discussion about some topic). Most, but not all, of these persons are from the nineteenth century, most are British, most are writers.
Interestingly enough, I most enjoyed the essays about the more 'atypical' persons: Francis (of Assisi), Tolstoy and Savonarola. The cause of this is probably in my 'disconnection' with Chesterton's nineteenth century, my lack of knowledge of several English writers (I never read Byron, Pope, Rostand and Carlyle; though I am now inspired to try their works sometime).
As said before, Chesterton sometimes merely uses the person he writes about for a more general discussion: for example, he discusses the genre of romantic writing starting with Sir Walter Scott. The discussion of Savonarolo points out how 'getting used to happiness' is a detriment for a real 'appreciation of life and laughter'. The simple 'love of things, not for their use or origin, but for their own inherent characteristics, the child's love of the toughness of wood, the wetness of water, the magnificent soapiness of soap', is one of Chesterton's repeating topics.
Still, I must say that this was not my favorite Chesterton thus far. After reading 'G.F.Watts' and 'Twelve Types', I still plan on reading 'Charles Dickens' (but not before I finished reading one of Dicken's thick novels for myself; I am on my way in 'Dombey and Son'), afterwards I'll definitely wait some time before taking up another of Chesterton's discussions about people.

'Tolstoy and simplicity

Tolstoy was actually a Count, but he spend part of his life 'among the peasants'. Chesterton considers this a 'heroic desire to return to nature', but he points out that there is a kind of artificiality in it, and a kind of futility. One cannot wish himself simple.
Tolstoy is, of course, a great writer. There is, however, a disparity between his literary writing and his didactic writing. This is particularly clear in 'War and Peace', where the reader can safely skip Tolstoy's philosophy of history, and just follow the story. Chesterton writes that this all 'arises from the search after a false simplicity, the aim of being, if I may so express it, more natural than it is natural to be'.
Chesterton continues by expressing admiration of Tolstoy's taking Christ's teachings really serious. Even here, though, he has a serious side-note: the 'accuracy' of some statements about the New Testament 'is by no means so striking as the confidence'. Chesterton points out the error of 'cutting up the teachings of the New Testament into five rules'.
All in all I am a little surprised about the amount of criticism Chesterton has on Tolstoy. But then, in our modern times we probably tend to disregard Tolstoy's philosophies and focus on his literary productions. In this Chesterton may have agreed: Count Tolstoy, he confesses, is a great artist.

Chesterton on Thomas Carlyle

I should start by confessing that I never consciously read even one sentence by Carlyle. Chesterton, though, makes me want to change that, for several reasons. First of all, he starts his discussion with the following fascinating paragraph:

There are two main moral necessities for the work of a great man: the first is that he should believe in the truth of his message; the second is that he should believe in the acceptability of his message. It was the whole tragedy of Carlyle that he had the first and not the second.

A second interesting observation is that Carlyle focused more on the underlying assumptions of logic, as opposed to the more normal stress on the subsequent logical reasoning from these assumptions.
Lastly, Chesterton makes clear that he does not agree with Carlyle's tendency to desire a consistent world view. He argues that this causes Carlyle to have some strange viewpoints, all in the name of consistency. This stress on consistency, is, according to Chesterton, a 'remarkable modern craze for making one's philosophy, religion, politics, and temper all of a piece'. He says that this 'existed comparatively little in other centuries'.
The last point is actually something I have to think more about: I have the tendency to think that consistency is a good thing. Chesterton seems to be pointing out that it can lead people to extremes.

Essays

Chesterton was a journalist: he wrote several essays that were later bundled in, for example, 'The defendant', or 'Twelve types'. This last book can be described as a collection of 'mini-biographies', but actually the essays discuss some general concepts, with a certain person as starting point.
One of Chesterton's favorite topics seems to be pessimism. This is discussed in the essay about Byron. The related topics about 'satire' and about 'comedies' have Pope and Rostand as focal points.
The essay about Francis of Assisi discusses ascetism; I am curious to read the book Chesterton wrote later in life about Francis. King Charles II is discussed in the context of Puritanism versus Restoration. The essay about Stevenson is actually about Stevenson, and about the misunderstandings around this writer. According to Chesterton Stevenson had not only 'the first qualification of a great man: that of being misunderstood by his opponents', but also 'the other essential qualification, that of being misunderstood by his admirers'. Because of the variety in his writings, no-one has really valued the complete and complex works of this author.

GKC

Except the American Chesterton Society and some related sites, I have not found too much activity about Chesterton on the web. That is: until, a few days ago, I stumbled on this weblog, which discusses various non-fiction books by Chesterton. The detail and depth of these discussions amazes me; I clearly have a lot to learn.
Furthermore, I found a Chesterton discussion forum, on which there are several recent discussions. I may not be out here all alone :).

Nineteenth century culture

Looking at the table of contents of 'Twelve types', I immediately notice several names that I do not recognize at all. Just as I never heard about G.F. Watts, I seem to be ignorant of these people that Chesterton takes the trouble to write about.
For me, it is a moment of realization of the cultural divide that separates me from Chesterton. The interesting thing, though, is that these pieces about unknown people can still have some interest to me. This includes, but is not limited to, his discussion about the (lack of) aesthetics of every-day objects, such as the English pillar box (which I personally find quite characteristic, if not beautiful):

In all created nature there is not, perhaps, anything so completely ugly as a pillar-box. Its shape is the most unmeaning of shapes, its height and thickness just neutralizing each other; its colour is the most repulsive of colours - a fat and soulless red, a red without a touch of blood or fire, like the scarlet of dead men's sins. Yet there is no reason whatever why such hideousness should possess an object full of civic dignity, the treasure-house of a thousand secrets, the fortress of a thousand souls. If the old Greeks had had such an institution, we may be sure that it would have been surmounted by the severe, but graceful, figure of the god of letter-writing. If the mediaeval Christians had possessed it, it would have had a niche filled with the golden aureole of St Rowland of the Postage Stamps. As it is, there it stands at all our street-corners, disguising one of the most beautiful of ideas under one of the most preposterous of forms. 

Biography

While reading Chesterton's discussion about the painter G.F. Watts, I noticed that he barely gives any biographical information. In his discussion of Charlotte Bronte, in 'Twelve types', I found out why: Chesterton considers precise points such as 'his exact class in society, the circumstances of his ancestry, the place of his present location' all unimportant, even irrelevant.
He illustrates with the case of Charlotte Bronte's 'Jane Eyre'. This novel, he says, is 'not true to manners, which are constantly false, or to facts, which are almost always false; it is true to the only existing thing which is true, emotion, the irreducible minimum, the indestructible germ'. The quality of the book stems not from Charlotte Bronte's experiences as a governess or a teacher, but from something deeper, more essential.
I myself am currently reading a biography about Chesterton. One wonders what he would have thought about that. And one thing is certain: up to now, I have not found too much relation between Chesterton's life and his writings (but then, I only just reached 1898).

G.F. Watts

In 1904, Chesterton wrote a book about the painter Watts, who died in that year. The book is not really a biography; there is only the bare minimum of details about Watts' life, it is more a discussion of Watts's art.
The book I borrowed from the local university library counts 76 pages, with (officially) 31 photographs (some were missing). On the web, one can easily find full color pictures of Watts' paintings.
Chesterton starts by discussing how the nineteenth century is, by the time of his writing, already started to be 'unintelligible'. Watts, however, is 'so deeply committed to, and so unalterably steeped in, this early Victorian seriousness and air of dealing with great matters', that it is necessary to discuss three essential points which define Watts as a nineteenth century painter: 'first, the sceptical idealism, the belief that abstract verities remained the chief affairs of men when theology left them; second, the didactic simplicity, the claim to teach other men and to assume one's own value and rectitude (see my posting of Jan 30); third, the cosmic utilitarianism, the consideration of any such thing as art or philosophy perpetually with reference to a general good.'. This century has passed, whether for good or for evil.
Watts' education and relation to the pre-Raphaelites are then discussed, followed by other influences and friendships. His two main types of pictures: portraits and allegories (see my posting of Feb 1) are discussed in detail in the last part of the book.
Though Chesterton does not pretend that Watts' is in all aspects a perfect painter, he does excite an interest in these paintings which is way beyond I ever had for any Victorian painter.

Pointers to Chesterton

If one googles on G.K. Chesterton, one of the hits on the first page says 'Who is this guy and why haven't I heard of him?'. It will refer you to a short piece on www.chesterton.org by Dale Ahlquist, the president of the American Chesterton Society. You will read a short introduction, which ends with a discussion why so few people actually heard of Chesterton.
As a recent Chesterton enthusiast, I started thinking about the various ways I could have heard about Chesterton. I did notice a 'Father Brown' series on television some years ago, but I never got around to actually watching it. I did buy a book with 'Father Brown' stories one day, but never got around to reading it. I heard that C.S. Lewis was influenced by several books, but never took the trouble of checking them out. I even heard the famous quote 'Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried'. But somehow I never connected all these pointers together. I wonder how many people do the same and just miss out on Chesterton's writings...
In the end, it was the books recommended by ccel that pointed me to 'Orthodoxy'; it was mentioned together with some classics as Augustine's 'Confessions', Bunyan's 'The pilgrim's progress', and Thomas a Kempis' 'The imitation of Christ'. After reading 'Orthodoxy', I started 'The everlasting man'. And when I found out that Chesterton did not only write apologetics, but also detective stories and essays about various topics, I was inspired to make a study of his writings, and to find out what they have to say to me today.

Allegory

A few days ago, I mentioned that I could appreciate Watts' portraits, but that I had difficulties with his other paintings. Today, it was as if Chesterton specifically addressed this topic: he discussed the function of allegory in paintings. He points out that the meaning of allegory in a painting should not be to say something that can be said better in words. It should not be something like a cipher-code, connecting the right symbols together to form a simple message. Watts' allegories are much richer, according to Chesterton.
The two main examples that are discussed are 'Hope' and 'Mammon'. Chesterton points out that even these words are, in fact, allegories for very complex and broad concepts. The paintings are just another way of depicting this ultimate, underlying reality.
Although these paintings are still not 'my style', at least now I understand more of them.