Scan barcode
michael_kelleher's review against another edition
5.0
Paul Elie really put together a well-crafted book. He wrote very honestly about each of his subjects. I enjoyed the emphasis on faith and art and pilgrimage. The book was incredibly interesting and thoughtful, but I have to say that the last chapter really did it for me. He pulls everything together without being trite or oversimplifying the religious experience of any of the writers. It was an honest look at what it means to have faith and how that looks different for different people. I highly recommend this to EVERYONE.
marcy_kelleher's review against another edition
5.0
Paul Elie really put together a well-crafted book. He wrote very honestly about each of his subjects. I enjoyed the emphasis on faith and art and pilgrimage. The book was incredibly interesting and thoughtful, but I have to say that the last chapter really did it for me. He pulls everything together without being trite or oversimplifying the religious experience of any of the writers. It was an honest look at what it means to have faith and how that looks different for different people. I highly recommend this to EVERYONE.
pldean's review against another edition
3.0
At once a social history, a critical literary study, and a joint spiritual biography, the book treats the lives of Walker Percy, Flannery O'Connor, Thomas Merton, and Dorothy Day. Catholics all, their pilgrimages are examined in the light of 20th-century modernism, rootlessness, and religious confusion. There are plenty of insights here for students and seekers alike.
pollyannamum's review against another edition
5.0
Elie is such a gifted storyteller that he--as the narrator--absolutely disappears from view as he weaves an incredibly well-designed exploration of four amazing personalities. In my all-time top 10.
heyhawk's review against another edition
4.0
I first read this back when I thought I was going to write a thesis on Walker Percy. It mostly holds up, though Elie seems to really dislike The Last Gentleman and Lost in the Cosmos, which I think are among Percy's best along with the Moviegoer and Love in the Ruins. He also praises The Thanatos Syndrome, which I think is Percy's weakest book despite Lancelot's unconvincing narrator. Overall, though, a really good joint biography for anyone interested in any of these authors.
msstewart's review against another edition
5.0
Long read, but great one. Felt like four biographies in one.
persey's review against another edition
3.0
Penetrating overall, but I think the author rather forced the connections between these four American Catholics, Dorothy Day in particular being somewhat of an odd man out, in regard to age and her non-literary pursuits. I also wondered at times what the author was choosing to leave out; his dismissal of Merton's death almost in passing as an accident without examining other theories struck me in particular.