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Literary Converts Kindle Edition

4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 47 ratings

Literary Converts is a biographical exploration into the spiritual lives of some of the greatest writers in the English language: Oscar Wilde, Evelyn Waugh, C.S. Lewis, Malcolm Muggeridge, Graham Greene, Edith Sitwell, Siegfried Sassoon, Hilaire Belloc, G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy Sayers, T.S. Eliot and J.R.R. Tolkien. The role of George Bernard Shaw and H.G. Wells in intensifying the religious debate despite not being converts themselves is also considered.

Many will be intrigued to know more about what inspired their literary heroes; others will find the association of such names with Christian belief surprising or even controversial. Whatever viewpoint we may have, Literary Converts touches on some of the most important questions of the twentieth century, making it a fascinating read.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This erudite book vividly contrasts the faith that marked the lives of many of Great Britain's more prominent writers of the 20th century with the unbelief that, the author believes, largely marked their times. Many of the book's "converts" began life as Anglicans and then converted to Roman Catholicism, though some, such as C.S. Lewis and T.S. Eliot, remained with the Church of England. Pearce is at his best when he situates writers within the frameworks of a changing Church and a changing world. For example, he claims that the Catholic Church's move away from the Latin mass hastened the emotional deterioration that directly preceded Evelyn Waugh's death. Pearce suggests that because of communist attacks on Catholics in Spain, Scottish poet Roy Campbell supported Franco and was somewhat sympathetic to Nazism. In discussing the post-World War II era, Pearce loses some of his focus: too many minor figures, including Ronald Knox and novelist Robert Hugh Benson, crowd the stage and detract from his more compelling descriptions of such deeply influential authors as G.K. Chesterton, Waugh, Eliot and Graham Greene. Despite its flaws, this volume nonetheless will edify and absorb the reader. (Mar.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"In Literary Converts, Joseph Pearce has scrutinized this roster of converts and found in it such names as Ronald Knox, R.H. Benson, G.K. Chesterton, Christopher Dawson, and many more. Catholic believers will be immensely heartened, and Christians (or others) who are not Catholic, are bound to find the whole thing vastly intriguing, if not positively convincing. Highly recommended."
—Thomas Howard, Author, On Being Catholic

"An absorbing narrative account of twentieth century English history — literary, social and intellectual. Anglophile readers will find it irresistible."
—Donna Steichen, Author, Prodigal Daughters

"Literary Converts is an admirable book. It looks at a wide range of novelists, poets, journailsts, essayists and pundits, and surveys their achievements from the point of view of their being Christian converts."
—A.N. Wilson, The Literary Review

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B002LDM8PY
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Ignatius Press (September 3, 2009)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ September 3, 2009
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 988 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 672 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 47 ratings

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Joseph Pearce
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Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
47 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book enlightening and engaging, tracing spiritual journeys of twentieth-century British authors. They praise the author as phenomenal and hearty. However, opinions differ on the writing quality - some find it crisp and literary, while others find it poorly written and hard to read.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

6 customers mention "Enlightened content"6 positive0 negative

Customers find the book's content enlightening and engaging. It brilliantly illuminates spiritual content of twentieth-century British and how they profoundly influenced each other. The compelling stories of faith are depicted with interesting lives and anecdotes. The book covers the intellectual and spiritual development of some of Europe's leading figures.

"...bite size chunks of just the length I like to read, but with a cliff-hanger story that sweeps through the entirety of the century, and that I could..." Read more

"...This book neatly traces their spiritual journeys, and how they profoundly influenced each other along the way...." Read more

"...It is rich with obscure quotations and depictions of very interesting lives that should not be obscure. The writing is crisp and compelling...." Read more

"...book Joseph Pearce performs a remarkable feat that brilliantly illuminates the spiritual content of twentieth-century British and American literature..." Read more

4 customers mention "Author"4 positive0 negative

Customers praise the author as an excellent writer. They describe him as energetic, jolly, and hearty.

"...He is a phenomenal writer. I am not a R. Catholic but I share more fellowship with his views than with many in the Protestant contingent today." Read more

"...And who can resist such an energetic, jolly, and hearty author like Chesterton?..." Read more

"To know that all of these brilliant, popular authors came to the same truths in the span of some 50 years is almost a miracle...." Read more

"A fascinating survey of great writers and thinkers for whom Christianity in its Catholic and Anglican forms was entirely relevant...." Read more

7 customers mention "Writing quality"3 positive4 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the writing quality. Some find it crisp, engaging, and articulate. Others describe it as poorly written, hard to read, and dry.

"...Here again, Pearce's writing was fresh and new, not because he launched the latest expose, not because it was new in the sense of novel, not because..." Read more

"I would it a bit hard to read and rather dry although there is a lot of good information in this book" Read more

"...to see unfold before my eyes a long procession of literary, articulate, intellectual and opinionated British authors queuing up to join the Catholic..." Read more

"Pretty disorganized. Shallow and poorly written but possessed of a few interesting anecdotes. Wildly overpriced for the thin gruel of the contents." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

  • Reviewed in the United States on March 9, 2015
    Other reviewers have offered lucid and lyrical reviews about this book. I'll write a down and dirty one to note a few points.
    One. I'm reviewing the Ignatius paperback edition of Literary Converts. I resisted reading it in the hardback, because I don't like reading hardbacks, and was delighted when Amazon got it in paperback.
    Two. This seems like a British book. Why? It is a British book. The Ignatius editions are American reprints. Some people will be put off by that, Not me. Everyone I read is British. This made the book all that much better.
    Three. The official "paid" review on this site says this book is essentially ruined by including minor characters such as Ronald Knox. I vehemently disagree with this on three points. One, Ronald Knox is, in a sense, the most "major" character in the book in that everyone in the book mentions him or knows him. He was only minor to the reviewer who, I think, did not read the book. Why? Because if you glanced at the chapter titles, you'd think this book was simply a collection of different convert stories. It's not. It moves chronologically from the beginning to the end of the century, which is what makes it so fascinating. There are plenty of books on one or a few converts. One of the best is by Father Charles Connor Classic Catholic Converts. Pearce has himself written some, and will likely write more. But this is the book that ties them all together.
    This could also make it boring reading to some people because it seems like Pearce merely quotes from other biographies on these converts, who are all writers and poets and artists of some sort. But that also is a strength because it means he doesn't merely paraphrase. I also can imagine him writing it in the British library, with all these sources close at hand, and which results in a sort of literary immersion which I find delightful.

    I've seen this in Pearce's other books, notably "C.S. Lewis and the Catholic Church" and "Wisdom and Innocence". The first I thought would be a ghastly propaganda book trying to show that Lewis, despite all appearances, was properly owned by Rome. But it wasn't that at all. It was extraordinarily delightful, as I note in my Amazon review. After reading lots of ghastly and obvious writing on Chesterton, the second book came as a delightful surprise. Here again, Pearce's writing was fresh and new, not because he launched the latest expose, not because it was new in the sense of novel, not because he had a different angle of approach. The reason it was so fresh was because it was none of those. It's very difficult to write a biography, but here is one which, side by side with Chesterton's own autobiography, rounded out the already round Chesterton, and gave a very delightful picture.

    Literary Converts is itself so literary, with short chapters as bite size chunks of just the length I like to read, but with a cliff-hanger story that sweeps through the entirety of the century, and that I could not put down. By which I mean that, no sooner had I put the book down than I took it up again. Who was really a revelation to me was Evelyn Waugh, author of Brideshead Revisited and many other novels. He wrote beautiful apologetics, which, when I checked the footnote, turned out to be letters. Well, I don't like reading books of letters, but the bits Pearce includes are both intriguing and literary, as letters (which is what the word means) used to be, when letter writing was an art. He also makes an inarguable argument against the modernizing of the Mass. When it was in Latin, it was the same all over the world. This doesn't seem like a big thing to Americans, but it was to Europeans who could so easily travel between countries. I was in Latin Club in high school. It's really not difficult to know enough Latin to understand the Mass, and as people argue for the beauty of the King James (Authorized) version of the Bible, despite the fact that the RSV is far more accurate in relation to the modern meaning of the words, the Latin Mass has it hands down in beauty over the English.

    If there's one thing I regret about this book it's that it's not a literary review, by which I mean Pearce doesn't discuss the books by the converts, despite the fact that they are all writers. However, it would be a much larger book if he did, and I don't like long books any better than I like hardbacks (in this I am opposite of C.S. Lewis, who liked the biggest cup of tea and longest book he could get). The quotes in the book, however, made me want to read more by R.H. Benson, since I've only so far read "Lord of the World", and most decidedly, Ronald Knox.
    24 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on July 30, 2022
    I love all the books I’ve read by Joseph Pearce. My one caveat is that this book and Literary Giants contain much of the same material. He is a phenomenal writer. I am not a R. Catholic but I share more fellowship with his views than with many in the Protestant contingent today.
  • Reviewed in the United States on August 31, 2012
    True to its title, Literary Converts is a succession of conversion stories. These conversion stories tie the book together, which would otherwise be a long series of mini-biographies. The conversion stories are of all or most of the reputable British authors who converted to Catholicism at some point in the 20th century, with nods to prominent converts to High Church Anglicanism (T.S. Eliot and C.S. Lewis). Not all authors receive the same treatment. The individuals on whom the light is brightest are Malcolm Muggeridge, Dorothy Sayers, Evelyn Waugh, Ronald Knox, Hillaire Belloc and G.K. Chesterton. These authors are frequently mentioned or quoted but the biographical information provided is hit and miss. Pearce provides fairly thorough descriptions of the conversion experience, a generally uneven description of their biographical history, and some discussion of some of their literary works.

    This random organization is more apparent with respect to the multitude of other authors mentioned. The comprehensiveness of the book in discussing probably every qualifying author is both the book's greatest strength and weakness. The comprehensiveness is the primary reason for the perfunctory nature of the biographies. I did not count, but I would estimate that this book included the conversion stories of much more than 50 writers. Some chapters read like unfinished but detailed notes written on a subject, where the author moved on to researching the next author before finishing the previous.

    While the uneven writing was hard to miss, it was fascinating to see unfold before my eyes a long procession of literary, articulate, intellectual and opinionated British authors queuing up to join the Catholic church. I was particularly interested in learning about the opinions and writings of Evelyn Waugh, Muriel Spark and Dorothy Sayers, and I plan to read more of their works. I would have liked to see greater depth for Graham Greene, whose portrait is rather slanted. Greened comes off looking about as sheepish as the priest in his novel, the Power and the Glory.

    J.R.R. Tolkien, who might be expected to figure prominently in such a work is occasionally alluded to, nothing more. He was not really a convert after all, since his mother became Catholic when he was an infant. Likewise, C.S. Lewis, while he is discussed more often that Tolkien, is held in the background, because this is a book about Catholics, and Lewis in converting from an atheist to a Christian never made it that far. There is a section that speculates that both Lewis and T.S. Eliot might have become Catholics if they had lived long enough to see the controversial reforms of the Anglican Church.

    Chesterton is the big revelation, who hovers, like a benevolent spirit, over the spiritual life of a surprising number of authors who found religion in the last century. His influence on his fellow writers was enormous. And who can resist such an energetic, jolly, and hearty author like Chesterton?

    It seemed appropriate that Oscar Wilde was only briefly discussed, but Siegfried Sassoon and Edith Sitwell, both pictured on the cover of my copy (along with Chesterton and Waugh), also got a very abbreviated treatment. There just wasn't room to tell the whole story with so many authors to discuss. But these are authors after all, and their works and in most cases book length biographies await further inspection. Literary Converts is thus a great jumping off point for a massive amount of further reading. Oh, and it also happens to contain more uses of the word "rumbustious" than any other work I know.
    3.5 stars.
    8 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Miriam D. F. Russell
    5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant work - highly recommendable!
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 22, 2018
    What a feat!! Read this amazing volume with great interest and gratitude to Joseph Pearce for delivering such an astounding piece on these literary converts and a very exciting and important time in our history. The attention to detail and the exposition of the different currents of thought in this period is very informative and enlightening. Great minds all around, and a wonderful service Joseph Pearce have done to us all in bringing these great minds to our attention in one single volume - bravo!
  • Robert Nairn
    5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
    Reviewed in Canada on May 30, 2016
    Great book

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