Showing results by author "G. K. Chesterton" in All Categories

'Madmen do not rebel against logic – they merely use it where it is not applicable.' A brilliantly unique collection of short stories, The Poet and the Lunatics was originally published in Nash's Magazine in 1921. Today, it remains a masterpiece of detective fiction. Gabriel Gale, an eccentric poet, often finds himself acting as detective when he becomes entangled in a series of bizarre and psychologically challenging events.

With his black hat, huge umbrella, unworldly simplicity and 'beaming but breathless geniality', Father Brown is one of fiction's best-loved amateur detectives. Short and tatty, but with the wisdom and insight to unravel the most wayward of criminal minds, he has entertained generations. In this collection of 13 full-cast dramatisations, the high priest of detection becomes involved in seven intriguing cases that will tax even his mental powers to the limit.

Shabby and lumbering, with a face like a Norfolk dumpling, Father Brown makes for an improbable super-sleuth. But his innocence is the secret of his success: refusing the scientific method of detection, he adopts instead an approach of simple sympathy, interpreting each crime as a work of art, and each criminal as a man no worse than himself… Here you will find the complete Father Brown stories in the chronological order of their original publication. The Innocence of Father Brown Starts at Chapter 1, The Wisdom of Father Brown Starts at Chapter 13.

A collection of thrilling tales from the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, including six full-cast dramas and a short story read by Benedict Cumberbatch In the first half of the 20th century, the detective story exploded in popularity. Innovative authors penned whodunits, whydunits and...

Chesterton's talent as a mystery writer is displayed in this collection of detective stories, The Man Who Knew Too Much. In each story, the star detective, Horne Fisher, deals with another strange mystery: the vanishing of a priceless coin, the framing of an Irish "prince" freedom fighter, an eccentric rich man dies during an obsessive fishing trip, another vanishing during an ice skate, a statue crushing his own uncle, and a few more.

Orthodoxy was named as one of Publishers Weekly’s 10 indispensable spiritual classics of the past 1500 years. It is the personal journal of one man’s search for understanding culminating in his conversion to Catholicism. Written with wisdom and wit, G.K. Chesterton captures the very nature of faith.

This is a top-quality audiobook of G. K. Chesterton's biography of St. Thomas Aquinas.

A short biography (1902) of a famous writer (Carlyle) by another famous writer (Chesterton). The first half exhibits Chesterton’s sly wit as he ruminates upon Carlyle’s work; the second half is straightforward biography. There are a great many pictures and portraits in the physical text. - Summary by David Wales

This mystery of the unconscious man, far deeper than any mystery of the conscious one, existing as it does in all men, existed peculiarly in Browning, because he was a very ordinary and spontaneous man. The same thing exists to some extent in all history and all affairs. Anything that is deliberate, twisted, created as a trap and a mystery, must be discovered at last; everything that is done naturally remains mysterious. ... [T]here is between making a map of a labyrinth and making a map of a mist. The life of Robert Browning, who combines the greatest brain with the most simple temperament ...

Examining several social and political trends of the time, Chesterton discusses contemporary discourse around family, gender roles, education, politics and more. In good humour, he defends the traditional family unit, praises women's unique role in society and promotes an education that can be both creative and moral in its teachings. He scrutinises the forces of modernity, bureaucracy and ideological reform, spiritedly arguing that the problem is not the structural powers at play in society, but the individual's failure to act rightly.

Chesterton's allegorical masterpiece is a surreal, psychologically thrilling novel that centres on seven anarchists in turn of the century London who call themselves by the names of days of the week. The story begins when poet Gabriel Syme is recruited as a detective to a secret anarchist division of Scotland Yard by a shrouded, nameless person. Syme infiltrates a secret meeting of anarchists who are intent on destroying the world and becomes known as 'Thursday', one of the seven members of the Central Anarchist Council.

Three BBC Radio performances of works by the great G. K. Chesterton. Best known as the creator of clerical detective Father Brown, G. K. Chesterton was a prolific and talented writer in virtually every area of literature: from novels, poetry and short stories to plays, biographies and essays. A noted thinker, controversialist, raconteur and wit, he has influenced authors from Neil Gaiman to Jorge Luis Borges. This collection comprises his two most famous novels as well as half a dozen tales from his short story collection

Father Brown is an eccentric priest with his own particular ways of dealing with crime. David Timson, having completed the whole of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes canon, a remarkable achievement, turns his hand to the genial but certainly not innocent priest! This collection contains a group of stories from the Innocence of Father Brown, told unabridged.

The year is 1984. The British government has become impersonal and apathetic, not run by a particular party or corresponding ideology, but by the random selection of a new figurehead each year. When the eccentric Auberon Quin is chosen to lead the country, the nation begins to take a whimsical turn. In an attempt to liven up London, Auberon transforms the city into a mock-medieval town, complete with crests, flags and costumes. Everything is a joke–that is until Adam Wayne, a young man claiming to be the Napoleon of Notting Hill, begins to take it seriously.

Part spy novel and part allegory, The Man Who Was Thursday centres on Gabriel Symes, a poet who was recruited by Scotland Yard to secretly infiltrate an anarchist group. During his first meeting with the anarchists, Symes is unexpectedly elected as a new delegate to the central council. Each member is named after a day of the week, and so Syme becomes ‘Thursday’. As he begins to unmask the other council members, he discovers that all is not what it seems: one by one these supposed anarchists are unveiled to be working undercover too. That is until Syme gets to man called ‘Sunday’…

The Return of Don Quixote centres on the character of Michael Herne, a gentle, quiet librarian. When Michael finds himself cast as a king in a medieval play, he reluctantly fulfils the role. But after the play's end, peculiar things start to occur: Michael begins donning armour, adopts chivalric ideals and boldly questions the hypocrisies of modern society. As Michael rallies for a movement that tackles misplaced power and dishonour, it's clear that a new Don Quixote is in town…

The humble yet shrewd Father Brown returns in a series of epic mysteries that see him use his gift of human understanding to solve the crimes at play. After all, it is not just logic and rational thinking that can get to the root of these crimes – but moral reasoning too. In these twelve tales, we see a man seemingly disappear from a locked room, a staged robbery, a fatal love triangle and much more. Rather than mere criminal tricks, these stories offer profound psychological and spiritual truths.

Originally published in 1927, The Secret of Father Brown sees our wise and moral amateur detective navigate more tales of crime and violence. Although quiet and unassuming, Father Brown has sharp skills of deduction and – most importantly – a deep, empathetic understanding of human nature, putting himself into the minds of the criminals he faces. From a mistaken suicide and a potential culprit with two faces, to a missing aristocrat and a remorseful killer, this brilliantly unique collection of short stories cement G.K. Chesterton as a master of the mystery genre.

Meet Basil Grant — former judge, occasional philosopher, and full-time eccentric — as he stumbles into a secret society unlike any other. In this exclusive club, the only rule of entry is that each member must invent a brand-new profession. The more bizarre, the better. When Basil's skeptical brother and a skeptical ex-detective friend get caught in a series of baffling encounters — including duels in flower gardens, poetry-as-business, and suspiciously polite assassins — they soon uncover a world where the line between genius and madness is dangerously thin.

Squire Vane, a noble man from Cornwall, has three 'peacock trees' in his local village, imported by his ancestors. However, a sinister legend hovers around these trees: it is said that they are destined to spread disease and bring severe misfortune to those who cross them. A rationalist to his core and allergic to any form of superstition, Squire dismisses these rumours as nothing but foolish whispers. But when some local village people raise the topic with Squire, he can take no more – angered, he insists on spending the night sleeping beneath the trees to prove their harmlessness.