The Catholic literary revival is a term that has been applied to a movement towards explicitly

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

allegiance and themes among leading literary figures in France and England, roughly in the century from 1860 to 1960. This often involved conversion to Catholicism or a conversion-like return to the Catholic Church. The phenomenon is sometimes extended to the United States.

France

French authors sometimes grouped in a Catholic literary revival include

Léon Bloy Léon Bloy (; 11 July 1846 – 3 November 1917) was a French Catholic novelist, essayist, pamphleteer (or lampoonist), and satirist, known additionally for his eventual (and passionate) defense of Catholicism and for his influence within French C ...

J. K. Huysmans Charles-Marie-Georges Huysmans (, ; 5 February 1848 – 12 May 1907) was a French novelist and art critic who published his works as Joris-Karl Huysmans (, variably abbreviated as J. K. or J.-K.). He is most famous for the novel ''À rebours ...

, Charles Péguy, Paul Claudel,

Georges Bernanos Louis Émile Clément Georges Bernanos (; 20 February 1888 – 5 July 1948) was a French author, and a soldier in World War I. A Catholic with monarchist leanings, he was critical of elitist thought and was opposed to what he identified as defea ...

and François Mauriac, as well as the philosophers

Jacques Maritain Jacques Maritain (; 18 November 1882 – 28 April 1973) was a French Catholic philosopher. Raised Protestant, he was agnostic before converting to Catholicism in 1906. An author of more than 60 books, he helped to revive Thomas Aquinas fo ...

and

Gabriel Marcel Gabriel Honoré Marcel (7 December 1889 – 8 October 1973) was a French philosopher, playwright, music critic and leading Christian existentialist. The author of over a dozen books and at least thirty plays, Marcel's work focused on the modern ...

England

The main figures who have been seen as constituting a revival of a leading Catholic presence in national literary life in England include

John Henry Newman John Henry Newman (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890) was an English theologian, academic, intellectual, philosopher, polymath, historian, writer, scholar and poet, first as an Anglican ministry, Anglican priest and later as a Catholi ...

Gerard Manley Hopkins Gerard Manley Hopkins (28 July 1844 – 8 June 1889) was an English poet and Jesuit priest, whose posthumous fame placed him among leading Victorian poets. His prosody – notably his concept of sprung rhythm – established him as an innovato ...

Hilaire Belloc Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc (, ; 27 July 187016 July 1953) was a Franco-English writer and historian of the early twentieth century. Belloc was also an orator, poet, sailor, satirist, writer of letters, soldier, and political activist. H ...

G. K. Chesterton Gilbert Keith Chesterton (29 May 1874 – 14 June 1936) was an English writer, philosopher, Christian apologist, and literary and art critic. He has been referred to as the "prince of paradox". Of his writing style, ''Time'' observed: "Wh ...

, Alfred Noyes,

Robert Hugh Benson Robert Hugh Benson AFSC KC*SG KGCHS (18 November 1871 – 19 October 1914) was an English Catholic priest and writer. First an Anglican priest, he was received into the Catholic Church in 1903 and ordained therein the next year. He wa ...

, Ronald Knox,

Graham Greene Henry Graham Greene (2 October 1904 – 3 April 1991) was an English writer and journalist regarded by many as one of the leading English novelists of the 20th century. Combining literary acclaim with widespread popularity, Greene acquir ...

, and Evelyn Waugh. Of these, Belloc was the only writer raised a Catholic; the others were adult converts.

J.R.R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawlins ...

, although a convinced Catholic, "is not generally perceived to be one of the key protagonists of the Catholic literary revival". In his writing, his own Catholic convictions and his use of Catholic themes are far less explicit than was the case for the other writers mentioned. There is, however, a growing tendency to look at Tolkien within the English Catholic literary tradition of his time. Although distinct, a movement towards explicit religious loyalty and themes in Anglican and Anglo-Catholic writers such as

George MacDonald George MacDonald (10 December 1824 – 18 September 1905) was a Scottish author, poet and Christian Congregational minister. He was a pioneering figure in the field of modern fantasy literature and the mentor of fellow writer Lewis Carroll. I ...

T. S. Eliot Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 18884 January 1965) was a poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic and editor.Bush, Ronald. "T. S. Eliot's Life and Career", in John A Garraty and Mark C. Carnes (eds), ''American National Biogr ...

C. S. Lewis Clive Staples Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963) was a British writer and Anglican lay theologian. He held academic positions in English literature at both Oxford University (Magdalen College, 1925–1954) and Cambridge Univers ...

and

Dorothy L. Sayers Dorothy Leigh Sayers (; 13 June 1893 – 17 December 1957) was an English crime writer and poet. She was also a student of classical and modern languages. She is best known for her mysteries, a series of novels and short stories set between th ...

is sometimes linked to the Catholic literary revival as a broader phenomenon.

United States

Due to the influence of Catholic literature from England in the United States,Arnold Sparr, ''To Promote, Defend, and Redeem: The Catholic Literary Revival and the Cultural Transformation of American Catholicism, 1920-1960'' (Greenwood Press, 1990). the concept of "Catholic revival" is sometimes extended to include American authors such as Dorothy Day,

Thomas Merton Thomas Merton (January 31, 1915 – December 10, 1968) was an American Trappist monk, writer, theologian, mystic, poet, social activist and scholar of comparative religion. On May 26, 1949, he was ordained to the Catholic priesthood and giv ...

William Thomas Walsh William Thomas Walsh (September 11, 1891 – January 22, 1949), was an historian, educator and author; he was also an accomplished violinist. Biography Walsh was born in Waterbury, Connecticut. His educational background included a B.A. from Yal ...

Warren Carroll Warren H. Carroll (March 24, 1932 – July 17, 2011) was the founder and first president of Christendom College in Front Royal, Virginia. He authored multiple works of Roman Catholic church history. Biography The son of Herbert Allen Carroll ...

Fulton Sheen Fulton John Sheen (born Peter John Sheen, May 8, 1895 – December 9, 1979) was an American bishop of the Catholic Church known for his preaching and especially his work on Catholic television, television and radio. Ordained a priest of the R ...

, Walker Percy,

J. F. Powers James Farl Powers (July 8, 1917June 12, 1999) was an American novelist and short story writer who often drew his inspiration from developments in the Catholic Church, and was known for his studies of Catholic priests in the Midwest. Although not a ...

and Flannery O'Connor. One of the early leaders of the revival in the United States was the editor and publisher

Francis X. Talbot Francis Xavier Talbot (January 25, 1889 – December 3, 1953) was an American Catholic priest and Jesuit who was active in Catholic literary and publishing circles, and became the President of Loyola College in Maryland. Born in Philadelphia, ...

References

Citations

Sources

*{{Cite book, title=To Promote, Defend, and Redeem: The Catholic Literary Revival and the Cultural Transformation of American Catholicism, 1920–1960, last=Sparr, first=Arnold, publisher=

Greenwood Press Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. (GPG), also known as ABC-Clio/Greenwood (stylized ABC-CLIO/Greenwood), is an educational and academic publisher (middle school through university level) which is today part of ABC-Clio. Established in 1967 as Gr ...

, year=1990, isbn=0-313-26391-4, series=Contributions to the Study of Religion, volume=25, location=Westport, Connecticut, pages=17–30, chapter=Chapter 2: Francis X. Talbot and the Catholic Literary "Emergence", access-date=December 29, 2019, chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=txGvERRncrgC&pg=PA17, archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191217150605/https://books.google.com/books?id=txGvERRncrgC&pg=PA17#v=onepage&q&f=false, archive-date=December 17, 2019, url-status=live, via=

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google Inc. that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical c ...

Literary movements 19th-century literature 20th-century British literature 20th-century French literature 20th-century American literature Catholic culture