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The Defendant

1901

G. K. Chesterton

The Defendant

G. K. Chesterton

1901

G.K. Chesterton wrote these essays to put certain things on trial - and you won't believe who wins. In his first collection, published when he was just 27, the young Chesterton takes on the role of attorney for the defense in case after case: detective stories, penny dreadfuls, newspaper headlines, awkward silences, the whole disregarded dunghill of daily existence. His argument is simple and radical: the world dismisses too easily. What we call "trash" often contains more genuine joy, more wild invention, more honest emotion than the solemn productions of the cultured elite. Chesterton writes with a pleasure that still feels electric more than a century later, as if he's letting you in on a secret. The essays range from celebrations of detective fiction to meditations on why we love coats of arms, from defenses of popular songs to the strange case of the thing we call "nonsense." If you've ever felt guilty for enjoying something unpretentious, The Defendant is your acquittal. It remains a joyful manual for anyone who wants to learn how to pay attention to the world and find it astonishing.

Project Gutenberg

A collection of essays written in the early 20th century, specifically the early 1900s. In this work, Chesterton passion...

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The Defendant
The Defendant
Project Gutenberg · 108 pages
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More books from this author

G. K. Chesterton
G. K. Chesterton
1874-1936

English writer and Christian apologist known for his wit and the Father Brown detective stories.

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The Wisdom of Father Brown
The Man Who Was Thursday
The Secret of Father Brown
Orthodoxy
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The Club of Queer Trades
What’s Wrong with the World
The Innocence of Father Brown
Aesop's Fables - Volume 01
The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare
The Ballad of the White Horse
The New Jerusalem
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