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The Ball and the Cross
The thrilling allegorical novel from the author of The Man Who Was Thursday and the Father Brown Stories First serialized in the Commonwealth, G. K. Chesterton’s fantastical third novel opens with a debate between Professor Lucifer and Brother Michael as they soar across the sky above London. Part farce, part theological exploration, The Ball and the Cross soon settles on the story of another pair of contraries. When differences of opinion lead an atheist and a devout Roman Catholic to plan a duel to the death, fate intervenes and propels the two men toward deeper understanding. Widely considered to be one of Chesterton’s most accessible and substantive works, The Ball and the Cross was commended by Pope John Paul I for the profound truths it reveals. Readers for over a hundred years have marveled at the brilliance of this exhilarating tale about belief, nonbelief, and our collective search for the truth. This ebook has been professionally proofread to ensure accuracy and readability on all devices.
87 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1910
About the author
G.K. Chesterton
3,552 books5,348 followersGilbert Keith Chesterton was an English writer, philosopher, lay theologian, and literary and art critic.
He was educated at St. Paul’s, and went to art school at University College London. In 1900, he was asked to contribute a few magazine articles on art criticism, and went on to become one of the most prolific writers of all time. He wrote a hundred books, contributions to 200 more, hundreds of poems, including the epic Ballad of the White Horse, five plays, five novels, and some two hundred short stories, including a popular series featuring the priest-detective, Father Brown. In spite of his literary accomplishments, he considered himself primarily a journalist. He wrote over 4000 newspaper essays, including 30 years worth of weekly columns for the Illustrated London News, and 13 years of weekly columns for the Daily News. He also edited his own newspaper, G.K.’s Weekly.
Chesterton was equally at ease with literary and social criticism, history, politics, economics, philosophy, and theology.
He was educated at St. Paul’s, and went to art school at University College London. In 1900, he was asked to contribute a few magazine articles on art criticism, and went on to become one of the most prolific writers of all time. He wrote a hundred books, contributions to 200 more, hundreds of poems, including the epic Ballad of the White Horse, five plays, five novels, and some two hundred short stories, including a popular series featuring the priest-detective, Father Brown. In spite of his literary accomplishments, he considered himself primarily a journalist. He wrote over 4000 newspaper essays, including 30 years worth of weekly columns for the Illustrated London News, and 13 years of weekly columns for the Daily News. He also edited his own newspaper, G.K.’s Weekly.
Chesterton was equally at ease with literary and social criticism, history, politics, economics, philosophy, and theology.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 264 reviews
November 22, 2024
Chesterton's zany misadventures of a young believer and his erstwhile nemesis, a gloomy antiquarian atheist, eminently proves the tried and true saying.... Necessity does INDEED make for STRANGE BEDFELLOWS!
Yes - Really Strange, because Londoners are by nature and by habitat dour and discreetly anonymous. They watch their manners.
But not THESE two amiable roustabouts. They take ZANY to New Extremes.
But mercenary would-be murderers DO turn into Bosom Buddies...
When a nefarious mechanical mastermind shoves the young green believer outa his new-fangled flying machine onto the Cross atop St Paul's Cathedral, you KNOW the fun's just beginning.
But that's real safe compared to where the youthful Catholic soon ends up!
Have you ever read J.B. Priestley’s grand adventure, The Good Companions?
The most unlikely of comrades, in their violent and desperate distaste for the multiplicity of socialistic rules and limitations during the 1930's Great Depression (shades of COVID legislations, you think?) join in the all-too-happy camaraderie of strangers to form a Troupe of Travelling Players.
So with Chesterton.
What a relief to find a Friend in a Feuding Duellist - after the Christian hero has clashed with an intelligent Atheist - Chesterton's embittered amigos likewise say!
Moral? You must TRASH YOUR PRIDE, if you want to regain love and value in your life.
Why do we hate our rivals so bitterly?
It's all vanity, says Chesterton, for the deadly duo bravely joins forces against the less obvious evils in the world.
Let's all bite the bullet and make pals of of our enemies!
Remember Mac Davis, fellow oldtimers???
Oh Lord, it's Hard to Be Humble
When you're perfect in every way!
I can't wait to look in the mirror...
I get Better Looking Each Day!
Know what? We will never get into Heaven thinking that way...
Cause NONE of us is perfect:
But the Lord is. And so's his Paradise: for the forgiving!
And so, all's well that ends well.
Yes - Really Strange, because Londoners are by nature and by habitat dour and discreetly anonymous. They watch their manners.
But not THESE two amiable roustabouts. They take ZANY to New Extremes.
But mercenary would-be murderers DO turn into Bosom Buddies...
When a nefarious mechanical mastermind shoves the young green believer outa his new-fangled flying machine onto the Cross atop St Paul's Cathedral, you KNOW the fun's just beginning.
But that's real safe compared to where the youthful Catholic soon ends up!
Have you ever read J.B. Priestley’s grand adventure, The Good Companions?
The most unlikely of comrades, in their violent and desperate distaste for the multiplicity of socialistic rules and limitations during the 1930's Great Depression (shades of COVID legislations, you think?) join in the all-too-happy camaraderie of strangers to form a Troupe of Travelling Players.
So with Chesterton.
What a relief to find a Friend in a Feuding Duellist - after the Christian hero has clashed with an intelligent Atheist - Chesterton's embittered amigos likewise say!
Moral? You must TRASH YOUR PRIDE, if you want to regain love and value in your life.
Why do we hate our rivals so bitterly?
It's all vanity, says Chesterton, for the deadly duo bravely joins forces against the less obvious evils in the world.
Let's all bite the bullet and make pals of of our enemies!
Remember Mac Davis, fellow oldtimers???
Oh Lord, it's Hard to Be Humble
When you're perfect in every way!
I can't wait to look in the mirror...
I get Better Looking Each Day!
Know what? We will never get into Heaven thinking that way...
Cause NONE of us is perfect:
But the Lord is. And so's his Paradise: for the forgiving!
And so, all's well that ends well.
July 21, 2013
My second Chesterton work has awakened in me a most wonderful kind of rage. It is the rage that drives a fervent Catholic to hurl a rock through the window of an editorial office. It is the rage with which an atheist prints blasphemy and logical syllogisms. The rage by which both men take up swords time and again to defend their views.
On the other hand, Chesterton's gentlemanly prose exudes forgiveness. Similarly to The Man Who Was Thursday, the author paints a picture of the cosmos's workings through the people who inhabit it. It is a picture of both hysterical structure and collected contradiction. The war between the ball and the cross is never biased, but always dynamic. I've never seen so strange a friendship in a book as the polemic bond between the two heroes. A mystic reader may be surprised by admiration of Turnbull's clever and earnest personality. The skeptic may find himself overtaken by MacIan's assurance and his support from the natural world.
The "unaffiliated" reader may be struck most profoundly, or not at all. The book is less a response to atheism than it is to fat-minded complacency. I mourn for those who have neutered their minds and actions, the lukewarm. The deluded and distracted are truly the most lost, and it might take a shock like this to awaken them. To awaken us, I should say. This book is a strikingly human document that progresses from madcap to metaphysical, and epitomizes the struggle between the material and the spiritual.
On the other hand, Chesterton's gentlemanly prose exudes forgiveness. Similarly to The Man Who Was Thursday, the author paints a picture of the cosmos's workings through the people who inhabit it. It is a picture of both hysterical structure and collected contradiction. The war between the ball and the cross is never biased, but always dynamic. I've never seen so strange a friendship in a book as the polemic bond between the two heroes. A mystic reader may be surprised by admiration of Turnbull's clever and earnest personality. The skeptic may find himself overtaken by MacIan's assurance and his support from the natural world.
The "unaffiliated" reader may be struck most profoundly, or not at all. The book is less a response to atheism than it is to fat-minded complacency. I mourn for those who have neutered their minds and actions, the lukewarm. The deluded and distracted are truly the most lost, and it might take a shock like this to awaken them. To awaken us, I should say. This book is a strikingly human document that progresses from madcap to metaphysical, and epitomizes the struggle between the material and the spiritual.
May 17, 2011
Utterly fantastic! I see now why all my Hillsdalians rave over Chesterton. I will certainly look for more of his works :) The Scandal in the Village chapter is perfect!
1. You cannot defeat the Cross, for it is defeat
2. The difference between Jesus and Satan is that Jesus wanted to descend, and so rose, while Satan wanted to rise and so fell.
1. You cannot defeat the Cross, for it is defeat
2. The difference between Jesus and Satan is that Jesus wanted to descend, and so rose, while Satan wanted to rise and so fell.
February 8, 2017
Chesterton’s novels almost stand in a genre of their own. Heavily philosophical, wildly allegorical, unapologetically adventurous, and comically surreal, it can be difficult even to describe them. And of them all, perhaps The Ball and the Cross is the most peculiar; which might be to say the worst, if you could even use a superlative negative in a sentence about Chesterton’s works. At least it does not operate on the same level of high genius as The Man Who Was Thursday. But what there is of it is unforgettable.
Read the rest at my blog, In Which I Read Vintage Novels
Read the rest at my blog, In Which I Read Vintage Novels
May 20, 2024
Another astounding, hilarious, fascinating masterpiece by the great G.K. Chesterton. I loved this so much and want to read it at least ten more times.
October 9, 2021
My first Chesterton read is complete! I LOVED it but I'm still processing everything, hence the four stars. This *will* be a reread, hopefully moving up to five stars. I've never seen two characters oppose each other so much, yet have such a strong friendship, but that is what I loved most about it. It was amazing how passionate Evan McIan and James Turnbull are for their beliefs. I also enjoyed the character arc of McIan because although he fights for Catholicism, he has his flaws just as Turnbull has his flaws. The best part though: never knowing where McIan and Turnbull's adventures are going to lead you! I don't think I understood everything, BUT I will forever be a Chesterton fan. :)
August 4, 2022
Chaotic and smart and strange and lovely and joyful and nightmarish and fun.
November 29, 2024
ENGLISH: Written one year later, this novel is the counterpoint to "The man who was Thursday", which I read five times many years ago. On the other hand, I have just read once "The ball & the cross". Perhaps this is the reason why I gave five stars to the former, and only four to the latter.
I am not disclosing anything if I say that the main antagonist in this novel represents the Devil, for from the beginning he is called Dr. Lucifer. The main characters are one atheist and a Catholic who pass the whole book trying to duel on a matter of convictions and are never allowed to do it. Thus they become the worst enemies of Dr. Lucifer, who cannot tolerate people who are essentially true to their convictions, whatever they are.
I should correct the previous assertion: in fact Dr. Lucifer fears one person even more than those two, but I won't disclose who he is and leave the reader to discover it.
ESPAÑOL: Escrita un año después, esta novela es el contrapunto de "El hombre que fue Jueves", que leí cinco veces hace muchos años. En cambio, sólo he leído una vez esta novela. Quizás por eso le di cinco estrellas a la primera y sólo cuatro a la segunda.
No desvelo nada si digo que el antagonista principal de esta novela representa al Diablo, pues desde el principio se le llama Dr. Lucifer. Los personajes principales son un ateo y un católico que se pasan todo el libro intentando batirse a duelo por una cuestión de convicciones y nunca se les permite hacerlo. Así se convierten en los peores enemigos del Dr. Lucifer, que no puede tolerar a las personas que son esencialmente fieles a sus convicciones, sean las que sean.
Debería corregir la afirmación anterior: de hecho, el Dr. Lucifer teme a una persona incluso más que a estos dos, pero no revelaré quién es y dejaré que el lector lo descubra.
I am not disclosing anything if I say that the main antagonist in this novel represents the Devil, for from the beginning he is called Dr. Lucifer. The main characters are one atheist and a Catholic who pass the whole book trying to duel on a matter of convictions and are never allowed to do it. Thus they become the worst enemies of Dr. Lucifer, who cannot tolerate people who are essentially true to their convictions, whatever they are.
I should correct the previous assertion: in fact Dr. Lucifer fears one person even more than those two, but I won't disclose who he is and leave the reader to discover it.
ESPAÑOL: Escrita un año después, esta novela es el contrapunto de "El hombre que fue Jueves", que leí cinco veces hace muchos años. En cambio, sólo he leído una vez esta novela. Quizás por eso le di cinco estrellas a la primera y sólo cuatro a la segunda.
No desvelo nada si digo que el antagonista principal de esta novela representa al Diablo, pues desde el principio se le llama Dr. Lucifer. Los personajes principales son un ateo y un católico que se pasan todo el libro intentando batirse a duelo por una cuestión de convicciones y nunca se les permite hacerlo. Así se convierten en los peores enemigos del Dr. Lucifer, que no puede tolerar a las personas que son esencialmente fieles a sus convicciones, sean las que sean.
Debería corregir la afirmación anterior: de hecho, el Dr. Lucifer teme a una persona incluso más que a estos dos, pero no revelaré quién es y dejaré que el lector lo descubra.
September 30, 2021
Possibly my favorite piece of Chesterton's fiction...which is saying a lot.
***
thoughts after my 4th read, fall 2021: not many to add, since I read it quickly (in roughly 24 hours), mostly to pull eugenics-related quotes from it for a paper I get to write this year. (eeh so excited!) Turnbull and MacIan are still the best. (and i never noticed that the first time the Girl sees MacIan, he's not only springing to her defense but springing to her defense WITH A MEDIEVAL SWORD IN HAND, and he's an excellent swordsman. so like...how is she not supposed to fall in love with him, exactly.)
***
thoughts added after my 3rd read, spring 2021:
This book. Oh, me, this book. It makes me so happy. SO HAPPY. Evan MacIan, the brooding young Catholic Highlander, and his truculent opponent, the redheaded atheistic London Scotchman James Turnbull, have my heart in a way that no other Chesterton characters do--and yes, that includes even dear, dear Fr. Brown and darling, darling Flambeau. Fr. Brown and Flambeau are FANTASTIC. But Evan MacIan and James Turnbull give me palpitations.
Particular things that I appreciate very much:
-) Even though Evan MacIan is the hero, by no means is he perfect. Yes, he's on fire to convert the world; but he himself is in need of conversion. His character arc is one of the most interesting ones in the book. In other words, Chesterton isn't simplistic about this Catholic vs. atheist thing.
-) James Turnbull, the atheist, is such a good, sturdy, good-humored, honest fellow. I love him more every time I read the book.
-) "Sincerity" is one of the key values in the story. Both these guys are SO BEAUTIFULLY SINCERE.
-) That part where Turnbull is like "Ugh, nature-worshippers, can't stand 'em" and MacIan is like "Yeah me neither...but isn't that what you atheists are all about?" and Turnbull is like "You thought we WHAT? *splutters* This is a case for beer" and MacIan's like "But the duel--!" and Turnbull is like "BEER!" and so they go get a drink and it's the beginning of a buddyhood
-) The bromance.
-) And also the romance. (You can't ask for more than a book that has squeal-worthy bromance AND squeal-worthy romance.)
-) Professor Lucifer and his flying ship are THRILLING in the way that only the best (as in worst) villains and nightmares can be. Plus they have a little steampunk aesthetic going on? Anyway, the dreams of MacIan and Turnbull are two of the BEST chapters in the book. They make me so excited.
-) And also, THIS BOOK IS ONE LONG ANGRY BEAUTIFUL SONG AGAINST EUGENICS.
With the caveat that there is some extremely politically incorrect terminology (it's 1909, after all), I have....no issues with this book. The ending's a little wild, maybe even a tad esoteric, and I don't think I understand it very well yet; but it's BEAUTIFUL.
This book is just. Just beautiful. I love it to death.
***
thoughts after my 4th read, fall 2021: not many to add, since I read it quickly (in roughly 24 hours), mostly to pull eugenics-related quotes from it for a paper I get to write this year. (eeh so excited!) Turnbull and MacIan are still the best. (and i never noticed that the first time the Girl sees MacIan, he's not only springing to her defense but springing to her defense WITH A MEDIEVAL SWORD IN HAND, and he's an excellent swordsman. so like...how is she not supposed to fall in love with him, exactly.)
***
thoughts added after my 3rd read, spring 2021:
This book. Oh, me, this book. It makes me so happy. SO HAPPY. Evan MacIan, the brooding young Catholic Highlander, and his truculent opponent, the redheaded atheistic London Scotchman James Turnbull, have my heart in a way that no other Chesterton characters do--and yes, that includes even dear, dear Fr. Brown and darling, darling Flambeau. Fr. Brown and Flambeau are FANTASTIC. But Evan MacIan and James Turnbull give me palpitations.
Particular things that I appreciate very much:
-) Even though Evan MacIan is the hero, by no means is he perfect. Yes, he's on fire to convert the world; but he himself is in need of conversion. His character arc is one of the most interesting ones in the book. In other words, Chesterton isn't simplistic about this Catholic vs. atheist thing.
-) James Turnbull, the atheist, is such a good, sturdy, good-humored, honest fellow. I love him more every time I read the book.
-) "Sincerity" is one of the key values in the story. Both these guys are SO BEAUTIFULLY SINCERE.
-) That part where Turnbull is like "Ugh, nature-worshippers, can't stand 'em" and MacIan is like "Yeah me neither...but isn't that what you atheists are all about?" and Turnbull is like "You thought we WHAT? *splutters* This is a case for beer" and MacIan's like "But the duel--!" and Turnbull is like "BEER!" and so they go get a drink and it's the beginning of a buddyhood
-) The bromance.
-) And also the romance. (You can't ask for more than a book that has squeal-worthy bromance AND squeal-worthy romance.)
-) Professor Lucifer and his flying ship are THRILLING in the way that only the best (as in worst) villains and nightmares can be. Plus they have a little steampunk aesthetic going on? Anyway, the dreams of MacIan and Turnbull are two of the BEST chapters in the book. They make me so excited.
-) And also, THIS BOOK IS ONE LONG ANGRY BEAUTIFUL SONG AGAINST EUGENICS.
With the caveat that there is some extremely politically incorrect terminology (it's 1909, after all), I have....no issues with this book. The ending's a little wild, maybe even a tad esoteric, and I don't think I understand it very well yet; but it's BEAUTIFUL.
This book is just. Just beautiful. I love it to death.
May 30, 2022
Entertaining and thought-provoking — 3.5 stars
I still generally prefer GKC’s non-fiction to his fiction. I believe this is the 5th of his novels that I’ve read. They they tend to be novels of ideas and are quirky and odd, with a fair amount of sermonizing by the characters. Sometimes, like here, it works.
The Ball and the Cross is really more of a modern fable, with many somewhat ridiculous elements, but it’s at turns humorous and profound. Probably my favorite GKC novel thus far.
But I’m still going back to his essays next.
I still generally prefer GKC’s non-fiction to his fiction. I believe this is the 5th of his novels that I’ve read. They they tend to be novels of ideas and are quirky and odd, with a fair amount of sermonizing by the characters. Sometimes, like here, it works.
The Ball and the Cross is really more of a modern fable, with many somewhat ridiculous elements, but it’s at turns humorous and profound. Probably my favorite GKC novel thus far.
But I’m still going back to his essays next.
February 7, 2020
This work touches on steampunk, and fantasy, and dystopian novels. But what it chiefly is is a philosophical thriller.
It opens with a debate between two characters who feature later, in an airship. But the chapter ends with a young man breaking a window, and the story takes off with that young man, a Catholic named MacIan, and the atheist whose window he broke, Turnbull, chasing around England trying to escape the police so they can fight a duel.
It features a car accident, a borrowed yacht, buying diplomacy in a shop, many long discussions, beer, swords, champagne, sunsets and sunrises, and much more.
It opens with a debate between two characters who feature later, in an airship. But the chapter ends with a young man breaking a window, and the story takes off with that young man, a Catholic named MacIan, and the atheist whose window he broke, Turnbull, chasing around England trying to escape the police so they can fight a duel.
It features a car accident, a borrowed yacht, buying diplomacy in a shop, many long discussions, beer, swords, champagne, sunsets and sunrises, and much more.
August 16, 2014
Another great book by G.K. Chesterton. The more I read of him, the more I'm a fan. Yes, I do think Chesterton is in the 'hate it or love it' category, and I think one must have a taste for his pretty peculiar way of writing, but if one does, all of his works are like draughts from a spring of fresh, clear water. This one is no exception, filled to the brim with his trademark paradoxes and witticisms, coupling an alagorical story with lively descriptions and characters that feel fully alive, marrying theological and philosphical speculation with an overwhelming love of life, giving one the impression of having been taken of a journey, more than just having read a book. Yes, this is unashamedly christian fiction, but it's also science fiction, and magical realism, with airships, and an apocalyptic conclusion. An atheist and a catholic seem to be the only ones left in the world to whom the question if God is real really means something, and they think their difference in opinion worth fighting about. The world does not think so and they are hindered at every point. Eventually though, even though they are saner than the people around them, they find they were also wrong: they must reach a position not of fanatism, but of love: love of the peculiar, the personal, love of the other (as exemplified by the pretty weird figure of the priest). That this novel ends with a miracla and a conversion could be seen as a cop out, but it doesn't feel like it is. It fits with the apocalyptic nature of the last chapters, of waking up in stead of dreaming, and reminds me of the miracle I hope to experience at the end of my life or of history. When we will no longer dream, but enter the end of all things that is more real, more concrete, than the world which it ends.
March 14, 2021
1st read:
I liked it but my main impression was confusion.
2nd read.
Well this took on a completly new depth of meaning to me the second time. It is also a very hard book to describe. It saturizes many differnt types of people, and brings different meaings to others.
But Chesterton was a REALLY tallented author, and he had a very vivid imagination. It is like a succession of events, connected by an invisible thread. The characters were fascinating , and sort of more real than life.
To quote the introduction in my edition by Paul Jennings:
"This is a wild book, a risk-taking book; but for him [Chesterton] the ordinary was the wild.It attempts, with what success the reader must judge for himself, to put into narrative, poetic, dramatic, allegorical."
Now I will put in a bunch of quotes from the Ball and the Cross (which is by the way a FANTASTIC name.)( Really a ridiculous amount of quotes.)
Weeeell actually I will spare the reader of this review, I will merely delight myself with them in my head.
I liked it but my main impression was confusion.
2nd read.
Well this took on a completly new depth of meaning to me the second time. It is also a very hard book to describe. It saturizes many differnt types of people, and brings different meaings to others.
But Chesterton was a REALLY tallented author, and he had a very vivid imagination. It is like a succession of events, connected by an invisible thread. The characters were fascinating , and sort of more real than life.
To quote the introduction in my edition by Paul Jennings:
"This is a wild book, a risk-taking book; but for him [Chesterton] the ordinary was the wild.It attempts, with what success the reader must judge for himself, to put into narrative, poetic, dramatic, allegorical."
Now I will put in a bunch of quotes from the Ball and the Cross (which is by the way a FANTASTIC name.)( Really a ridiculous amount of quotes.)
Weeeell actually I will spare the reader of this review, I will merely delight myself with them in my head.
September 21, 2008
Probably the best of Chesterton's fiction that I have read. I think this book may be better than The Man Who Was Thursday. The society outlined in this book looks eerily like our own. The whole world has gone insane, yet it has placed the sane in the asylum. Chesterton does justice to the fact that there can be friendship between disagreeing parties, and this friendship can do more than all the battles to soften hearts and make them receptive to the grace of God.
December 19, 2022
Year after year went by, and at last a man came by who treated Mr. Turnbull's secularist shop with a real respect and seriousness. He was a young man in a grey plaid, and he smashed the window.
The cross cannot be defeated... for it is Defeat.
I like everything of Chesterton's I've read so far. His style is so identifiably his, and so fun and joyful and true. This was a really crazy and wonderful adventure, and I highly recommend it. Flying spaceships and the eucharist and an asylum and a motorcar chase could only all be in the same book if Chesterton wrote it.
We do not announce on flaring posters that a man has not fallen off a scaffolding. Yet this... is fundamentally more exciting, as indicating that that moving tower of terror and mystery, a man, is still abroad on the earth.
Catholic virtue is often invisible because it is the normal... Christianity is always out of fashion because it is always sane.... The Church always seems to be behind the times, when it is really beyond the times; it is waiting till the last fad shall have seen its last summer. It keeps the key of a permanent virtue.
You complain of Catholicism for setting up an idea of virginity; it did nothing of the kind. The whole human race set up an idea of virginity; the Greeks in Athene, the Romans in the Vestal fire, set up an ideal of virginity. What then is your real quarrel with Catholicism? Your quarrel can only be, your quarrel really only is, that Catholicism has achieved an ideal of virginity; that it is no longer a mere piece of floating poetry.
He drunk in the last green and the last red and the last gold, those unique and indescribable things of God, as a man drains good wine at the bottom of his glass. Then he turned and saluted his enemy.
"I want you to hate me!" cried Turnbull, in agony. "I want you to be sick when you think of my name. I am sure there is no God."
"But there is," said Madeline, quite quietly... "Why, I touched His body only this morning."
"You touched a bit of bread," said Turnbull, biting his knuckles...
"You think it is only a bit of bread," said the girl, and her lips tightened ever so little.
"I know it is only a bit of bread," said Turnbull, with violence.
She flung back her open face and smiled. "Then why did you refuse to eat it?"
I will pay the penalty of having enjoyed God in this monstrous modern earth that cannot enjoy man or beast. I will die happy in your madhouse, only because I know what I know.
The world left to itself grows wilder than any creed... That is the only real question — whether the Church is really madder than the world. Let the rationalists run their own race, and let us see where they end. If the world has some healthy balance other than God, let the world find it. Does the world find it? Cut the world loose... Does the world stand on its own end? Does it stand, or does it stagger?
The cross cannot be defeated... for it is Defeat.
I like everything of Chesterton's I've read so far. His style is so identifiably his, and so fun and joyful and true. This was a really crazy and wonderful adventure, and I highly recommend it. Flying spaceships and the eucharist and an asylum and a motorcar chase could only all be in the same book if Chesterton wrote it.
We do not announce on flaring posters that a man has not fallen off a scaffolding. Yet this... is fundamentally more exciting, as indicating that that moving tower of terror and mystery, a man, is still abroad on the earth.
Catholic virtue is often invisible because it is the normal... Christianity is always out of fashion because it is always sane.... The Church always seems to be behind the times, when it is really beyond the times; it is waiting till the last fad shall have seen its last summer. It keeps the key of a permanent virtue.
You complain of Catholicism for setting up an idea of virginity; it did nothing of the kind. The whole human race set up an idea of virginity; the Greeks in Athene, the Romans in the Vestal fire, set up an ideal of virginity. What then is your real quarrel with Catholicism? Your quarrel can only be, your quarrel really only is, that Catholicism has achieved an ideal of virginity; that it is no longer a mere piece of floating poetry.
He drunk in the last green and the last red and the last gold, those unique and indescribable things of God, as a man drains good wine at the bottom of his glass. Then he turned and saluted his enemy.
"I want you to hate me!" cried Turnbull, in agony. "I want you to be sick when you think of my name. I am sure there is no God."
"But there is," said Madeline, quite quietly... "Why, I touched His body only this morning."
"You touched a bit of bread," said Turnbull, biting his knuckles...
"You think it is only a bit of bread," said the girl, and her lips tightened ever so little.
"I know it is only a bit of bread," said Turnbull, with violence.
She flung back her open face and smiled. "Then why did you refuse to eat it?"
I will pay the penalty of having enjoyed God in this monstrous modern earth that cannot enjoy man or beast. I will die happy in your madhouse, only because I know what I know.
The world left to itself grows wilder than any creed... That is the only real question — whether the Church is really madder than the world. Let the rationalists run their own race, and let us see where they end. If the world has some healthy balance other than God, let the world find it. Does the world find it? Cut the world loose... Does the world stand on its own end? Does it stand, or does it stagger?
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Blurb:
Due to certain irreconcilable differences two Scottish men, one being Catholic and the other being atheist, decide to fight a duel to the death. However, duels are against the law, so they have to find a secret place for that occasion. Searching for such place they must avoid authorities, and also numerous kinds of people who all try to convince them to give up on a duel, leading to many comic adventures.
Blurb:
Due to certain irreconcilable differences two Scottish men, one being Catholic and the other being atheist, decide to fight a duel to the death. However, duels are against the law, so they have to find a secret place for that occasion. Searching for such place they must avoid authorities, and also numerous kinds of people who all try to convince them to give up on a duel, leading to many comic adventures.
August 30, 2016
The Ball And the Cross is about two Scotchmen, an atheist and a Catholic, who, due to certain irreconcilable differences, decide to fight a duel to the death. Unfortunately dueling is against the law, so the two champions are forced to make a run for it across the English countryside, avoiding the authorities and various philosophical types that try to stop them, in search of a place where they can kill each other peacefully.
It's a fun book, like most of Chesterton's fiction, and it's also profound, albeit a little heavy-handed on the symbolism (but we wouldn't read Chesterton if we didn't need a little of that). And after all the fun and various profundities, the feeling I am left with is the same from book to book when it comes to this author; I wish I understood Christianity the way that mirth-and-girth Gilbert did. To illustrate, I leave you with a quote:
'MacIan turned upon the Tolstoyian with a white face and bitter lip. “Sir,” he said, “talk about the principle of love as much as you like. You seem to me colder than a lump of stone; but I am willing to believe that you may at some time have loved a cat, or a dog, or a child. When you were a baby, I suppose you loved your mother. Talk about love, then, till the world is sick of the word. But don’t you talk about Christianity. Don’t you dare to say one word, white or black, about it. Christianity is, as far as you are concerned, a horrible mystery. Keep clear of it, keep silent upon it, as you would upon an abomination. It is a thing that has made men slay and torture each other; and you will never know why. It is a thing that has made men do evil that good might come; and you will never understand the evil, let alone the good. Christianity is a thing that could only make you vomit, till you are other than you are. I would not justify it to you even if I could. Hate it, in God’s name, as Turnbull does, who is a man. It is a monstrous thing, for which men die. And if you will stand here and talk about love for another ten minutes it is very probable that you will see a man die for it.”'
Make of it what you will.
It's a fun book, like most of Chesterton's fiction, and it's also profound, albeit a little heavy-handed on the symbolism (but we wouldn't read Chesterton if we didn't need a little of that). And after all the fun and various profundities, the feeling I am left with is the same from book to book when it comes to this author; I wish I understood Christianity the way that mirth-and-girth Gilbert did. To illustrate, I leave you with a quote:
'MacIan turned upon the Tolstoyian with a white face and bitter lip. “Sir,” he said, “talk about the principle of love as much as you like. You seem to me colder than a lump of stone; but I am willing to believe that you may at some time have loved a cat, or a dog, or a child. When you were a baby, I suppose you loved your mother. Talk about love, then, till the world is sick of the word. But don’t you talk about Christianity. Don’t you dare to say one word, white or black, about it. Christianity is, as far as you are concerned, a horrible mystery. Keep clear of it, keep silent upon it, as you would upon an abomination. It is a thing that has made men slay and torture each other; and you will never know why. It is a thing that has made men do evil that good might come; and you will never understand the evil, let alone the good. Christianity is a thing that could only make you vomit, till you are other than you are. I would not justify it to you even if I could. Hate it, in God’s name, as Turnbull does, who is a man. It is a monstrous thing, for which men die. And if you will stand here and talk about love for another ten minutes it is very probable that you will see a man die for it.”'
Make of it what you will.
August 13, 2016
Another Sci-Fi story from Chesterton, however much easier to follow than The Man Who Was Thursday. A real duel with arms needs to take place between a Catholic and an atheist, they struggle to find the right place and so they become fugitives and comrades. Their adventures are both funny and witty and both of them start leaning towards his enemy.
Chesterton again surprised me by being able (in such a short book) to portray two opposite characters in such a way that the reader feels sympathy for both of them. This story is not only a duel between theism and atheism, but an example of how any extreme would lead to a broken world. It also reminds the reader that common sense is what will save humanity. I loved that it makes fun out of some materialists who will take materialism over facts, even when the fact is standing in front of them. As Albert Einstein once said, "if the facts don't fit the theory, then change the facts"; in this book, Chesterton takes this mockery to the next level by implying that modern "science" (psychology in this case) would rather ignore all the facts and declare everyone crazy in order to convince others than something real doesn't exist (the duel between the main characters).
I recommend this book because it provides good entertainment while explaining big philosophical, theological and rationalistic issues from two very opposite standpoints. Once again I closed a G.K. Chesterton book with a big smile on my face.
Chesterton again surprised me by being able (in such a short book) to portray two opposite characters in such a way that the reader feels sympathy for both of them. This story is not only a duel between theism and atheism, but an example of how any extreme would lead to a broken world. It also reminds the reader that common sense is what will save humanity. I loved that it makes fun out of some materialists who will take materialism over facts, even when the fact is standing in front of them. As Albert Einstein once said, "if the facts don't fit the theory, then change the facts"; in this book, Chesterton takes this mockery to the next level by implying that modern "science" (psychology in this case) would rather ignore all the facts and declare everyone crazy in order to convince others than something real doesn't exist (the duel between the main characters).
I recommend this book because it provides good entertainment while explaining big philosophical, theological and rationalistic issues from two very opposite standpoints. Once again I closed a G.K. Chesterton book with a big smile on my face.
December 24, 2011
Bizarre but certainly entertaining and provocative. I'm a big fan of Chesterton with his rollicking plots and writing style and the question is why he is not more widely read today, albeit having a niche group of fans that apparently includes Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. I had a glimmer of the answer in reading his collected Essays -- including one in which he defends the jury as opposed to the single judge system, in the spirit of democracy; his argument, to me, felt dated, although i empathise with his faith in the common sense of the everyday man and his concern for the abuse of power. The Ball and the Cross also feels a little dated. Chesterton (as well as CS Lewis) appears to have this caricatured conception of modern science as a Nietzschean will to power, and his villain in this case is an abstract polemic made flesh rather than a fully fleshed out character. Then again most of his fictional writing is really metaphysical argument couched as story. Having said that I very much like the balanced and respectful way in which he portrays Turnbull, the humanist atheist, and his slight satire of the humorless MacIan -- this of course despite his personal bias in beliefs toward the latter.
November 30, 2021
The Ball and the Cross is similar to The Man Who Was Thursday. It starts slow but ever so gradually, the gas pedal is pressed. You get more and more exciting, and before you know it, you have an ending that wraps nicely and is extremely Christian.
Like Thursday, the story is best understood as a theological-philosophical thriller. I have not come across any other author who can do this, save for C.S. Lewis in his space trilogy. It is almost a completely unique genre that Chesterton is very gifted at writing.
Would highly recommend.
Like Thursday, the story is best understood as a theological-philosophical thriller. I have not come across any other author who can do this, save for C.S. Lewis in his space trilogy. It is almost a completely unique genre that Chesterton is very gifted at writing.
Would highly recommend.
November 5, 2019
I am giving the book 5 stars because of how brilliantly it is written. Every sentence is an incredible show of vocabulary and description, a joy to read. The story itself seems to go from very literal to symbolic about 2/3rds in. The first literal part I found to be very comic and clever at getting at the ridiculous avenues of relativism and asks the question “what is worth fighting for if not our beliefs?” The second part, the more symbolic part, takes on a slightly darker tone. I liked the ending and will need to reflect more on the symbols and meaning of the final third, but overall a great read and one I think would be good to discuss with another person.
September 9, 2024
A marvelous read. Something of an extended parable about how the greatest opponent to society is not the atheist, but the one who eschews discussing religion in the name of polite society.
And because it's Chesterton, it's also tremendously entertaining.
And because it's Chesterton, it's also tremendously entertaining.
November 14, 2024
I absolutely loved this read, and hope to return to it many more times. Funny yet serious, deeply philosophical and yet it remained a story — it might be a new favorite of mine, and I hope to read more of Chesterton’s fiction works after it!
July 15, 2020
Brilliant - both hilarious and challenging - definitely shaped my thinking in a good way!
February 9, 2016
This is the first work of fiction by Chesterton I've read. It's a fine book. Elegant and witty writing prevails throughout. Chesterton, a devout Catholic, makes the atheist the most lovable character.
It's funny. It's funny like Twain and Wodehouse are funny. It's also deep at times, often at the same time that it's being funny.
This book may not be for everyone. Some will find it too philosophical. Some will say that Chesterton is engaging in straw man arguments, that he does a poor job presenting the atheist's side of things, but by the end of it I felt Turnbull's ideas were well represented. And I'm sure some will say it is silly.
I say this is an important book and should be widely read. I loved it, and I loved it more than I have loved a new book in quite some time.
It's funny. It's funny like Twain and Wodehouse are funny. It's also deep at times, often at the same time that it's being funny.
This book may not be for everyone. Some will find it too philosophical. Some will say that Chesterton is engaging in straw man arguments, that he does a poor job presenting the atheist's side of things, but by the end of it I felt Turnbull's ideas were well represented. And I'm sure some will say it is silly.
I say this is an important book and should be widely read. I loved it, and I loved it more than I have loved a new book in quite some time.
November 9, 2020
I've read a few Chesterton novels to date, and I always find that there is something confusing about them. The worst part is knowing that it is a deeper truth that I just don't understand yet, and that if I were to give the book another go, or perhaps even a third, I would probably have that light-bulb moment when everything would make sense. So, as it is, I'm a bit confused. Perhaps enlightenment will come with subsequent readings.
On the whole though, it was an amusing and fascinating book. The ending was where I got confused, but up until that point, I was pretty well engaged. I recommend it to any Chestertonian.
On the whole though, it was an amusing and fascinating book. The ending was where I got confused, but up until that point, I was pretty well engaged. I recommend it to any Chestertonian.
July 28, 2019
Well, I must say I did thoroughly love this read. As it got further into the strangeness of any Chesterton novel, I was all the more excited by the strange but profound turns. I guess I feel so like a poor chap from the story that I too often think I have gone mad in this world believing in the things I do. It was so great at turning my head toward the non-material, the world that is to come. I found that even the submission to the wrong and odd was kind of ok as one longs for the world to come. Judgement and all things will be made right...and somehow even I whom is also wrong will be let into a world of real truth and beauty. Refreshing. Odd. Profound.
May 14, 2014
Many reviewers have called this entire novel a confusing allegory, and even Chesterton himself confessed in later years that he was a bit confused by it. Nevertheless, the story of an atheist and an orthodox Roman Catholic trying to fight a duel over faith, despite continual police intervention, is amusing and interesting. Duels were decidedly uncouth in Edwardian England, as indeed was any public discussion of religion. Religion was a private matter, after all. The climax is a bit more puzzling, but Chesterton's wit keeps you engaged throughout the book.
November 15, 2024
Read Heretics and Orthodoxy before reading this book, and it will enrich your reading tenfold. Chesterton really is brilliant, and this is the perfect fictional combination of those books. It's also hilarious.
I did get quite lost in the second half of the book. It seemed to get a bit too nonsensical for me to follow. I'm somewhat unclear on the ending but it might just take a few rereads and a conversation with my husband (who claims this is his favorite book) to clear it up.
I did get quite lost in the second half of the book. It seemed to get a bit too nonsensical for me to follow. I'm somewhat unclear on the ending but it might just take a few rereads and a conversation with my husband (who claims this is his favorite book) to clear it up.
November 21, 2018
A funny, farcical story about a Christian and an atheist who keep trying to fight a duel, but are constantly waylaid. Read for Dr. Wood's Oxford Christians course at Baylor (Fall 2014).
Available as an illustrated edition.
Available as an illustrated edition.
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