Friday, April 28, 2006

G.K. Chesterton: Common Sense Apostle & Cigar Smoking Mystic

Dale Ahlquist, author of G.K. Chesterton: Apostle of Common Sense and president of the American Chesterton Society, reflects on the robust, timeless faith of the rotund, timely G.K. Chesterton.

There comes a time in the life of any artist, any writer or poet, when he reaches the end of his abilities, when he finds himself wrestling all night with an angel. It is the moment when he tries to think the thought which thought cannot think, to visualize the invisible and describe the indescribable. He can arrive early or late at that moment in his career, but it changes everything. It is an encounter with the Absolute. It means either an end or a beginning. Either the artist limps away with discouragement at not being able to rise above himself, his creativity exhausted and extinguished. Or else, when grappling with the angel, the artist grabs hold and refuses to let go until he is given a blessing, and with it a new name and a new vision. At that moment filled with eternity, his art and his words pass from one realm into another. They become immortal. More

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