Comments on: Canon of catholic Literature

By: Michael Mlekoday

Michael Mlekoday — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 04:42:26 +0000

Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poetry. This guy was the greatest poet of the Victorian Age and wrote Modernist poetry before Modernism arose. He was a Jesuit priest.

By: An Anxious Anglican

An Anxious Anglican — Sun, 25 May 2008 21:38:03 +0000

I just finished All Hallow’s Eve by Charles Williams, and have to say that I was not impressed. His War in Heaven was definitely a better written and more engaging novel. There were exquisite sentences in All Hallow’s Eve (a previous reader of this particular library book had even bracketed some of them in red ink), but unfortunately they were few and far between. Notwithstanding my disappointment with the work, I will take the image of “cascading kindness” in the form of a late-night glass of water for one’s spouse with me forever.

By: MJFD

MJFD — Thu, 08 May 2008 03:03:44 +0000

Look at the anthology The Substance of Things Hoped For by John Breslin, SJ. It is out of print (although I am trying to change that) but it contains a shopping list for this discussion. These are short stories and while some of the authors have wirtten novels, in many cases the short story is their method of choice.

You can find copies of the book at Amazon, Abe’s Books and Alibris…if I don’t buy them all first.

Many of the authors prefer to think of themselves as Catholics who write literature and not Catholic writers.

Flannery O’Connor had to deal with a prominent critic who claimed that beccause she was a Catholic, it was not possible for ner to write good literature (not an exact quote obviously).

One in the collection, Bernard MacLaverty, describes himself on his own web site as no longer being Catholic. But in the short story he wrote, there is no doubt what he was. And if you look at the collection that The Beginnings of a Sin comes from, A Time to Dance, you will find someone very Catholic.

By: Spirit of Vatican II

Spirit of Vatican II — Wed, 07 May 2008 04:06:25 +0000

There are great German novels but they lose a lot in translation — Musil, Mann, Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship (trans. Carlyle) and Elective Affinities (aka Kindred by Choice), Fontane’s Effi Briest and Unwiederbringlich.

Flaubert, Balzac, Austen, Eliot’s Middlemarch, Henry James, are of course must reads.

George Moore, The Lake (1921 version) and Muslin.

By: Spirit of Vatican II

Spirit of Vatican II — Wed, 07 May 2008 04:02:40 +0000

Teaching Racine’s Phedre and Mauriac’s Therese just now, I’d like to add the latter’s Destins (Lines of Life — ET out of print).

By: radicalcatholicmom

radicalcatholicmom — Mon, 05 May 2008 18:37:06 +0000

Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather.

By: DarwinCatholic

DarwinCatholic — Mon, 05 May 2008 13:51:41 +0000

Looking at your original list, I’d personally suggest reading at most one Tolstoy novel and if you want a good Russian fix bulk up on the Dostoyevski.

You might consider adding a piece or two by mid-19th century Anglican writer Anthony Trollope. The Warden and Barchester Towers are good examples (the first two) from his Barchester series, which deals with Anglican ecclesiastical life and politics.

Dorothy Sayers is another English writer worth reading from a religious perspective. I’d recommend Unnatural Death (which is set in part among a set of “roaming catholic” Anglo Catholics) and also Gaudy Night and Busman’s Honeymoon.

Also, if you’re willing to violate your “dead guys only” rule, I’d recommend Tim Powers’ Declare and Donna Tartt’s Secret History.

By: kishnevi

kishnevi — Mon, 05 May 2008 04:13:40 +0000

A few people have mentioned All Hallows Eve and War in Heaven, but there are several others by Williams which are at least as good: Descent into Hell, Greater Trumps, and Place of the Lion, with Many Dimensions not far behind. The only bad novel he wrote is Shadows of Ecstasy, and even that can be worth a read.
There’s also at least one of the Peter Wimsey stories (Sayers) which can be included in the list–The Nine Tailors.
Kazantzakis’ Greek Passion is probably another one that should be on the list.
Mansfield Park (Jane Austen) is definitely one.
If you want CS Lewis, you should include Pilgrim’s Regress.
Fielding’s Tom Jones and Amelia.
That should last you a couple of days :)

By: Murdoch

Murdoch — Sun, 04 May 2008 18:36:00 +0000

Rose Macaulay, The Towers of Trebizond

By: Gerald Augustinus

Gerald Augustinus — Sun, 04 May 2008 18:03:23 +0000

James Joyce – A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

By: desalesh

desalesh — Sun, 04 May 2008 17:22:19 +0000

are films books? if so, everything by Robert Bresson (he adapted The Diary of a Country Priest, listed above, and another story by Bernanos, Mouchette.) He is, in my opinion, one of the great Catholic Thinkers.

also, what about the poets? precious few of those listed so far!

Racine, Phedre
Pascal, Pensées
St. Francis DeSales, Introduction to the Devout Life

here are just a few…

T. S. Eliot
George Herbet
John Donne
Czezlaw Milosz
Geoffrey Hill
R.S. Thomas
Seamus Heaney
Robert Lowell (started out as a RC Convert)
John Ashbery is, amazingly, an Episcopalian

By: An Anxious Anglican

An Anxious Anglican — Sun, 04 May 2008 00:10:56 +0000

Another few works came to mind by an Anglican author! I respectfully submit for your consideration the Space/Science Fiction Trilogy by C.S. Lewis (Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength). It is far more “adult” than the Chronicles of Narnia and the prayer sequence/vision near the end of Perelandra was quite nearly sacramental!