Ladydale Diary
The Transfiguration, 2021
Well, what can be said of the annual Chesterton Conference – except thanks be to God that it’s back after last year’s covidious interruption!?! Having spent last weekend with my fellow Chestertonians in an understaffed covidious hotel in Chicago, I can say that this annual Chesterfest is a real highlight of my year. So many good people, all of them kindred spirits!
I arrived on the second day of the conference, on Friday afternoon, and was taken up into the festive spirit from the first moment of my arrival until my departure on Sunday morning. Most of the time I was rooted to my book table, talking to multifarious people and selling multiple books. My one formal part of the conference was a talk on Saturday morning on “The Humour and Humility of Chesterton”. As I never write my talks and always speak “off the cuff” or ad lib, I gain great energy and enthusiasm from the engagement and enthusiasm of the audience. This probably explains why I tend to rise to the occasion at Chesterton conferences. The engagement and enthusiasm of the audience is beyond any comparison. What a joy!
Apart from my talk and my hours at the book table talking to those of kindred spirit, I enjoyed the “afterglow” in the evening, after the formal proceedings had concluded, meeting old friends and making new ones. The wine flowed, as did the ale, and the cocktails, along with the conversation and conviviality. I’m already looking forward to next year!
As for the morning after the night before, or the week after the conference the weekend before, it’s been both blessed and fruitful. Deo gratias!
On Monday, I received from Michelle, our graphic designer, the uncorrected page proofs of the next issue of the St. Austin Review, or StAR. What a great issue we have in store for our subscribers, whom I consider la crème de la crème of cultured Catholics. This next issue (Sep/Oct) is a “Homage to Dante”, commemorating the seven hundredth anniversary of the angelic poet’s death. Great articles. Great art. If any members of the Inner Sanctum are not subscribers to StAR, please check it out. You won’t be disappointed. It’s been a labour of love for me ever since I was asked to be StAR’s editor when it was first launched, back in England when I still lived there. That was way back in 2001. Today, twenty years on, I feel blessed to remain at the helm. StAR and I are getting old together!
This week I’ve written an essay for the Imaginative Conservative on Tolkien’s Philosophy of Myth, which accompanies the course I’m currently teaching for Memoria College on Wednesday evenings and the new podcast series I’ve just launched here in the Inner Sanctum. Check it out!
I also wrote the next “nutshell” in the “Great Literature in a Nutshell” series I’m writing for Crisis Magazine. This week’s essay is on The Merchant of Venice, arguably the best and indubitably the most controversial of Shakespeare’s comedies. In addition, I wrote a book review for the Chesterton Review of Holly Ordway’s excellent new book, Tolkien’s Modern Reading: Middle-earth Beyond the Middle-Ages.
I’ve also given two radio interviews. Yesterday evening, I was interviewed by Father Hezekias on Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn for the Institute of Catholic Culture’s show on the Guadalupe Radio Network, and this morning (Friday), I gave my weekly interview on “Poems Every Catholic Should Know” for Sacred Heart Radio, discussing Saint Robert Southwell’s poem, “Decease Release”, which is about Mary Queen of Scots. Then at 11am, I resumed my teaching online for Red Cultural in Chile, beginning a four-week course on Jacobean Shakespeare. Today I gave an hour-long lecture on Othello, followed by a lively and enjoyable discussion. I then dashed off to the gym to remind my muscles that they exist and then returned home to spend this afternoon recording the podcasts for this week’s Inner Sanctum, culminating in the writing of this week’s Ladydale Diary, which brings us literally and literarily to the present moment.
And so ends another week at Ladydale (and beyond) during which I have remained ever grateful for my friends in the Inner Sanctum who support me an my work. Domine non sum dignus and Deo gratias – and thank you too!
