Thomas Merton

Description

“A useful compendium for those already familiar with the breadth and depth of Merton’s vision, and a splendid introduction for those encountering Thomas Merton for the first time.”—Brother Patrick Hart

Thomas Merton, the Trappist monk who died in 1968, was one of the greatest spiritual writers of the twentieth century. His published works include a hundred volumes in many genres. But it was perhaps in the essay form that Merton found his natural element.

Thomas Merton: Selected Essays is the first volume to provide a broad cross-section of Merton’s work as an essayist, collecting pieces that are characteristic examples of his astonishing output and the fantastic breadth of his interests. The 33 essays collected here range from the wisdom of the desert fathers to the novels of Faulkner and Camus, from interreligious dialogue to racial justice, from the nuclear threat to the philosophy of solitude, and, throughout, the centrality of the Christian mystery to authentic human identity.

Especially in the last decade of his life, Merton showed in his essays an increasing willingness to dispense with prefabricated conclusions, ringing his deeply spiritual, profoundly Catholic sensibility to bear on matters beyond the usual “religious” and “monastic” milieu. Indispensable for beginners and experts alike, Thomas Merton: Selected Essays provides in a single volume a glimpse into the mind and soul of a true literary and spiritual master.

Patrick F. O’Connell is professor in the Departments of English and Theology at Gannon University, Erie, Pennsylvania. A founding member and former president of the International Thomas Merton Society, he edits The Merton Seasonal and is coauthor of The Thomas Merton Encyclopedia (Orbis, 2006).