A Reading Goal Met

 

Each year I set reading goals. I have an overall goal based on number of works and pages - this year 60-70 works and 15,000 pages.

I also set specific goals about genres and particular writers. One of those writers each year is G. K. Chesterton. I had two goals related to him: a book about him, and a book by him that I had not previously read. 

Earlier this year I read The Gift of Wonder: The Many Sides of G. K. Chesterton edited by Dale Ahlquist, meeting the first goal. In the last week, I finished The Club of Queer Trades, meeting the second Chesterton goal.

It was an early effort on his part - 1905. And it seemed to be making fun of detective fiction. The "detective" in this case, Rupert Grant, keeps getting things wrong. Meanwhile his brother, the retired judge Basil Grant, solves the puzzles, always ending up with no crime being committed!

I had the sense that Basil was Chesterton projecting himself into the story. Hmm.

The title is based on a club where the members come up with odd and original trades that provide them with a living. 

There is plenty of Chestertonian humor in the characters. I think he was having fun.

I enjoyed it. I was considering several of his books to read, and I'm glad I chose this one.

By the way, among my other individual reading goals, ones that I also met:

The Adventures of Tom Bombadil by J. R. R. Tolkien

A book by C. S. Lewis, possibly a reread - The Weight of Glory

A book by Charles Dickens I have not yet read - Our Mutual Friend

A book by Dostoevsky - The Possessed

Indeed, I have met all of my specific goals, with The Club of Queer Trades being the last one met.

All have left are my overall goals, and I am on my way to meeting them. I'm up to 56 works, so 60 - 70 is well within reach. And my page count is up to 13,141 - so I just have about 2,000 pages to go.

Oh, That Don Juan

 

October 7 was the anniversary of the Battle of Lepanto, which took place on October 7, 1571. The fleet of the Holy League, under the command Don Juan of Austria, the illegitimate son of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, defeated a larger, more powerful Turkish fleet. The Christians credited the praying of the Rosary for the victory - hence October 7 is now celebrated as the Feast of Our lady of the Rosary. Meanwhile, Don Juan was lauded as a hero.

G. K. Chesterton wrote his most famous, and one of this best. poems about the victory, "Lepanto." In the poem he referred to Don Juan - in the poem, "Don John" repeatedly, calling him "the last knight of Europe." 

"Don John of Austria is going to the war."

That particular line is repeated a copuple of times later in the poem.

Chesterton also says at later points:

"Don John of Austria/Is riding to the sea."

And

"Don John of Austria/Is gone by Alcalar."

 And

"Don John of Austria is girt and going forth."

And so on.

Okay, Don Juan was the hero of the battle, and the poem. But what happened to him after the battle.

It's unclear all that he was up to at first, he captured Tunis in 1573, for example, but it was retaken by the Ottoman Empire a year later. In 1576, he was named governor-general of the Spanish Netherlands, part of which were in rebellion against Spanish rule, in part because they had become Protestant and did not want to be controlled by a Catholic ruler. In 1577, Don Juan led the forced that captured Namur, and in 1878 won the Battle of Gembloux, but on July 31, 1578, he was defeated at the battle of Rijmenam. He retreated, and before he could pursue further action, got sick and died October 1, 1578. He was just 31.

In addition to his fighting, Don Juan also engaged in some activities that make him less than a Catholic hero. Prior to the battle he had fathered an illegitimate daughter by one woman, and after the battle, another illegitimate daughter born in 1573 to a different woman - who was just 17 - and an illegitimate son in 1574 by yet another woman. At the time of his death, he was in a "relationship" with still another woman. 

Chesterton did not dwell on this part of "Don John's" life. Or even allude to it.

The poem ends simply:

"But Don John of Austria rides home from the Crusade."

 

St. Francis

"Now for St. Francis nothing was ever in the background. We might say that his mind had no background, except perhaps that divine darkness out of which the divine love had called up every colored creature one by one. He saw everything as dramatic, distinct from its setting, not all of a piece like a picture but in action like a play. A bird went by him like an arrow; something with a story and a purpose, though it was a purpose of life and not a purpose of death. A bush could stop him like a brigand; and indeed he was as ready to welcome the brigand as the bush." - G. K. Chesterton

Back in the mid 1970s I was struggling with my faith. Three books helped to right my spiritual ship: The Seven Storey Mountain by Thomas Merton, The Confessions St. Augustine, and St. Francis of Assisi by G. K. Chesterton.

Chesterton's book about St. Francis is considered one of the best biographies of the saint. It certainly was inspiring to me.

I'd known a little about St. Francis before reading the book. I grew up near a Franciscan monastery. I'd seen the 1961 movie about him. But reading Chesterton's book pushed me to learn more, and St. Francis has been pivotal to my life since. I've now read multiple books about him and seen several movies about him. Fifteen years ago, I even professed as a Secular Franciscan.

This year marks the 800th anniversary of St. Francis' transitus - his transition from earthly life to life in heaven with God - which took place October 3, 1226. Franciscans around the world will be celebrating that anniversary.  

In 1980, I was inspired to write a poem about St. Francis.  

San Damiano

"One day in the church of St.
Damian, he (St. Francis) hears
words spoken from the Crucifix:
'Go, Francis, and repair my
house; as you can see, it is
falling into ruin.''

   --- Fr. Stanislaus Majarelli, OFM

The roses are in bloom at San Damiano.
Their scent bleeds into the air,
flows down from the hills,
floods the streets of Assisi
like the beggars who cry,
``Bread and stones,
bread and stones.''

In the shadowy cafe,
men sit
hearing to the calls.
One man spits and mutters a curse.
Another man begins a bawdy song
that pours out
into the darkening air.

At midnight: silence.
Fog shrouds the streets
and snakes into the hills.

The hills rise above the fog
like islands in a dead sea.
And taller still
rises
San Damiano's half-built steeple
reaching toward

heaven.