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On Something
“Now that story is a symbol, and tells the truth. We see some one thing in this world, and suddenly it becomes particular and sacramental; a woman and a child, a man at evening, a troop of soldiers; we hear notes of music, we smell the smell that went with a passed time, or we discover after the long night a shaft of light upon the tops of the hills at morning: there is a resurrection, and we are refreshed and renewed.”
--- Hilaire Belloc
_____________
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
--- Hilaire Belloc
_____________
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
286 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1910
13 people are currently reading
61 people want to read
About the author
Hilaire Belloc
732 books409 followersPeople considered Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc, French-born British writer, as a master of light English prose and also knew widely his droll verse, especially
The Bad Child's Book of Beasts
in 1896.
Sharp wit of Hilaire Belloc, an historian, poet, and orator, extended across literary output and strong political and religious convictions. Oxford educated this distinguished debater and scholar. Throughout his career, he prolifically across a range of genres and produced histories, essays, travelogues, poetry, and satirical works.
Cautionary Tales for Children collects best humorous yet dark morals, and historical works of Hilaire Belloc often reflected his staunch Catholicism and critique of Protestant interpretations. He led advocates of an economic theory that promotes and championed distribution of small-scale property ownership as a middle ground between capitalism and socialism alongside Gilbert Keith Chesterton, his close friend.
In politics, Hilaire Belloc served as a member of Parliament for the Liberal party, but the establishment disillusioned him. His polemical style and strong opinions made a controversial figure, who particularly viewed modernism, secularism, and financial capitalism as threats to traditional Christian society in his critiques.
Influence and vast literary legacy of Hilaire Belloc extends into historical circles. Erudition, humor, and a forceful rhetorical style characterized intellectual vigor and unique perspective, which people continue to study and to appreciate, on history, society, and human nature.
Sharp wit of Hilaire Belloc, an historian, poet, and orator, extended across literary output and strong political and religious convictions. Oxford educated this distinguished debater and scholar. Throughout his career, he prolifically across a range of genres and produced histories, essays, travelogues, poetry, and satirical works.
Cautionary Tales for Children collects best humorous yet dark morals, and historical works of Hilaire Belloc often reflected his staunch Catholicism and critique of Protestant interpretations. He led advocates of an economic theory that promotes and championed distribution of small-scale property ownership as a middle ground between capitalism and socialism alongside Gilbert Keith Chesterton, his close friend.
In politics, Hilaire Belloc served as a member of Parliament for the Liberal party, but the establishment disillusioned him. His polemical style and strong opinions made a controversial figure, who particularly viewed modernism, secularism, and financial capitalism as threats to traditional Christian society in his critiques.
Influence and vast literary legacy of Hilaire Belloc extends into historical circles. Erudition, humor, and a forceful rhetorical style characterized intellectual vigor and unique perspective, which people continue to study and to appreciate, on history, society, and human nature.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
July 13, 2024
Review of the short story, "Home" from this collection.
The framing story was mildly amusing: the narrator is sketching a woodland view in rural France when he’s interrupted by a dishevelled middle-aged man:
“He was in the clothes of an English tourist, which looked odd in such a place, as, for that matter, they do anywhere.”
The man, Peter, asks the name of the grand house on the horizon, and when it’s not the one he hopes, he says:
“Firstly… are you always quite sure whether a thing is really there or not?”
He proceeds to explain why he’s there. The artist dislikes the distraction:
“I was not even very much interested, for I was trying to make the trees to look different one from the other, which is an extremely difficult thing.”
Peter’s story isn’t very original (dream, death, drugs, Sleeping Beauty, prophecy… I didn’t care which) and doesn’t really connect with the framing story. Like the narrator, I was not even very much interested.
Better Belloc
I have loved and memorised Belloc's humorous verses, Cautionary Tales for Children, all my life, as I explained in my review, HERE. Nothing else by him was going to be able to compete, and this certainly didn’t.
Short story club
I read this in Black Water: The Anthology of Fantastic Literature, by Alberto Manguel, from which I’m reading one story a week with The Short Story Club, starting 4 September 2023.
You can read this story, HERE.
You can join the group here.
The framing story was mildly amusing: the narrator is sketching a woodland view in rural France when he’s interrupted by a dishevelled middle-aged man:
“He was in the clothes of an English tourist, which looked odd in such a place, as, for that matter, they do anywhere.”
The man, Peter, asks the name of the grand house on the horizon, and when it’s not the one he hopes, he says:
“Firstly… are you always quite sure whether a thing is really there or not?”
He proceeds to explain why he’s there. The artist dislikes the distraction:
“I was not even very much interested, for I was trying to make the trees to look different one from the other, which is an extremely difficult thing.”
Peter’s story isn’t very original (dream, death, drugs, Sleeping Beauty, prophecy… I didn’t care which) and doesn’t really connect with the framing story. Like the narrator, I was not even very much interested.
Better Belloc
I have loved and memorised Belloc's humorous verses, Cautionary Tales for Children, all my life, as I explained in my review, HERE. Nothing else by him was going to be able to compete, and this certainly didn’t.
Short story club
I read this in Black Water: The Anthology of Fantastic Literature, by Alberto Manguel, from which I’m reading one story a week with The Short Story Club, starting 4 September 2023.
You can read this story, HERE.
You can join the group here.
January 5, 2025
Read together with the Short Story Club in The Black Water 1 anthology. An unknown author to me. A story about a home that may or may not have been real. Nothing special.
July 10, 2024
2 stars
Review of the story "Home" as read with the GR Short Story Club.
A rather lacklustre, meh story about an Englishman roaming the French countryside in search of a mysterious house he visited...or believed he visited. Did he dream his visit or did he enter an alternate reality he now can no longer find his way back to.
There's really nothing supernatural or creepy about the story, so it's odd that it would be in an anthology of speculative and paranormal stories.
Review of the story "Home" as read with the GR Short Story Club.
A rather lacklustre, meh story about an Englishman roaming the French countryside in search of a mysterious house he visited...or believed he visited. Did he dream his visit or did he enter an alternate reality he now can no longer find his way back to.
There's really nothing supernatural or creepy about the story, so it's odd that it would be in an anthology of speculative and paranormal stories.
July 9, 2024
*only the story "Home"
Read
July 9, 2024Read only the "Home" story for a group discussion.
https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/...
https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/...
December 21, 2024
Only "Home," read for my GoodReads short story group
++++++++++++++++++
This story of a walk in the French countryside leading to a ghostly kind of chateau that may or may not be real at all is not what I was expecting from Hillaire Belloc…I admit that all I've ever read previously by him is his children’s poetry, which I recall as being a little like Shel Silverstein, had he written half a century earlier. This story, on the other hand, is quite different, more along the lines of the strange tales of Arthur Machen or Clark Ashton Smith.
Strangely, it also seems to presage Philip K Dick in the way that it questions the nature of reality, something almost always at the center of Dick’s work. There is a short story by Dick called “The Commuter,” which also involves a train and a longing for a lost reality by a man for whom “real” life has left him weary and disappointed. It was made into an episode of Electric Dreams, with Timothy Spall in the main role. And that also makes me think of the excellent episode of The Twilight Zone called “A Stop at Willoughby," which also expresses a terrible longing for a place and time that has been lost to the present.
++++++++++++++++++
This story of a walk in the French countryside leading to a ghostly kind of chateau that may or may not be real at all is not what I was expecting from Hillaire Belloc…I admit that all I've ever read previously by him is his children’s poetry, which I recall as being a little like Shel Silverstein, had he written half a century earlier. This story, on the other hand, is quite different, more along the lines of the strange tales of Arthur Machen or Clark Ashton Smith.
Strangely, it also seems to presage Philip K Dick in the way that it questions the nature of reality, something almost always at the center of Dick’s work. There is a short story by Dick called “The Commuter,” which also involves a train and a longing for a lost reality by a man for whom “real” life has left him weary and disappointed. It was made into an episode of Electric Dreams, with Timothy Spall in the main role. And that also makes me think of the excellent episode of The Twilight Zone called “A Stop at Willoughby," which also expresses a terrible longing for a place and time that has been lost to the present.
July 10, 2024
I only read the story "Home" with the Short Story Club.
May 4, 2010
I was going to give this book 3 stars because these essays are something of a mixed bag. However, the last 5 essays in the book were so honest, beautiful and true, that I had to upgrade the book to 4 stars.
September 18, 2010
Varied essays on varied topics by essayist Hilaire Belloc...
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews