Views Black Power and the 1619 Project By Alexander Riley Radically recasting America’s formative years would be damaging enough, but The New York Times’ “1619 Project” is applying that same radical intellectual perspective on American history to contemporary social issues and problems. Read More
Views Learning From Our Hard Corona Days By Christopher DeGroot The world has reached a new level of boredom, it seems. “The sole cause of man’s unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room,” wrote Blaise Pascal. That sentence, like others from the Pensées (1670), is deservedly famous. Read More
Views Virginia's Creeping Authoritarianism By Pedro L. Gonzalez Even before the nationwide government crackdown in the wake of the COVID-19 virus, the unprecedented reaction of Virginia’s government against civilian protesters showcased the potential for authoritarianism to rear its head in America… Read More
Society & Culture The Theatrical Tradition of Dorothy Sayers By Crystal Downing In 1941, bestselling novelist Dorothy L. Sayers (1893-1957) ignited a religious controversy that reverberated throughout England. Ironically, Sayers was motivated not by a defiance of tradition but by an intense desire to preserve it. Read More
Society & Culture Plague Literature: The Threshing Floor By Jack Trotter Since plague is one of those natural disasters whose origin cannot be assigned to human agency, it can pose seemingly insoluble moral problems…Does God in fact directly will suffering, or does he merely permit it? Read More
Reviews What the Editors Are Reading By Srdja Trifkovic Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella of split personality, the Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), and The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers (1987) by Paul Kennedy Read More
Reviews Books in Brief By Chris Timmers The Art of Statistics, by David Spiegelhalter (Basic Books; 448 pp., $32.00). Uncanny Valley: A Memoir, by Anna Wiener (MCD; 288 pp., $27.00). Read More
Reviews A Skeptic on the Road of Saints By John DeJak Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Timothy Egan’s latest book chronicles his pilgrimage along the Via Francigena. Read More
Reviews The Mind Behind Big Brother By John O'Neill Few works in literature are as terrifying as 1984, that look into the future written by George Orwell and published in 1949. British scholar Dorian Lynskey unravels the novel’s themes, inspirations, and intentions in his latest book. Read More
Reviews Empire States of Mind By Ronald J. Granieri Although this relatively short book is closer to an extended, episodic essay than to the comprehensive history of the British Empire implied by the title, it is an excellent example of the author’s style. Jeremy Black takes a broad view… Read More
Remembering the Right Remembering the Southern Agrarians By Joe Scotchie In 1920 a group of writers gathered in Nashville for bi-weekly sessions of reading and dissecting each other’s prose and poetry. The group, who defended the traditional Southern way of life, became known as the Southern Agrarians. Read More
Remembering the Right Remembering Whittaker Chambers By Joseph S. Salemi At first glance, the personal history of Whittaker Chambers does not suggest a conservative frame of mind. Read More
Polemics & Exchanges Defense of Bill Buckley By It is hard to know where to begin in responding to Jack Trotter’s profile of a founding father of the modern conservative movement (“Remembering William F. Buckley, Jr.,” April/May 2020). Read More
Editorials Looking for Moral Foundations (in All the Wrong Places) By Paul Gottfried A debate unfolded last year in American Greatness between Chronicles contributor Mark Pulliam and the Claremont Institute’s Edward Erler, a devotee of Harry Jaffa. According to Erler, Robert Bork and others who adhered to strict constitutional origi… Read More
Correspondence An Easter Reflection: The Mystery of Goodness By Wayne Allensworth The sun broke through the thin, whispery clouds, and its reflection in a pool of water collected from the previous night’s rain caught my eye. Suddenly the day was bright and the morning as clear and joyful as hope itself. Resurrection Day. Read More
Breaking Glass Praying Alone By Philip Jenkins When Americans look back on 2020, the year of the virus, they will see multiple transformations. I fear that some of the most sweeping changes will come in the realm of religion, marking a grim turning point in the story of American faith. Read More
The American Interest Monocultural Resilience By Srdja Trifkovic At the end of the ongoing global melodrama’s first quarter, it seems reasonable to predict that this will be a two-act play with the final curtain coming down in July. It will end as a tragedy, not because the outcome was preordained… Read More
Short Views Go Big or Go Home By Tom Piatak Before the coronavirus slammed into the United States in a way that few foresaw, it seemed Donald Trump was heading to reelection based on a record of genuine, though modest, accomplishments. Read More
Under the Black Flag The Pandemic of Godlessness By Taki Theodoracopulos It is a universally acknowledged truth that when epidemics strike, men and women turn to God. Read More
In the Dark Hankering Hereafter By George McCartney The Invisible Man (2020) • Seven Stages to Achieve Eternal Bliss (2018) • Panic in the Streets (1950) Read More