Orthodoxy

G. K. Chesterton was a giant of Edwardian Fleet Street, a journalist, novelist and debater with a gift for paradox. When critics complained that he attacked everyone else's philosophy without offering his own, he answered with this book. He tells it as the story of a man who set out to invent a new philosophy and found he had landed on orthodox Christianity. He was like a sailor who sets off to discover a new island and lands, triumphantly, on England.

Orthodoxy is less a tidy argument than a fireworks display. Chesterton shows how modern ideas, pushed to their end, lead to madness or despair, and how the Christian creed keeps life balanced, sane and full of wonder. In “The Ethics of Elfland,” he argues from fairy tales that the world is a gift and gratitude is the proper reply. He wrote it years before becoming Catholic himself, but you can already see the road to Rome.

It suits literary and imaginative seekers, skeptics who enjoy a sparring partner, and anyone who needs reminding that faith can be joyful. Read slowly. Keep a pencil handy.