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Daylight and Nightmare: Uncollected Stories and Fables
An anthology of thirty-five previously uncollected stories ranges from witty frolics to chilling tales of madness and murder
144 pages, Hardcover
Published January 1, 1986
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About the author
G.K. Chesterton
4,681 books5,815 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 - 13 of 13 reviews
February 9, 2026
As the title suggests, this is a book about daylight and nightmare(s). This is Chesterton at his most eerie — for me this is a Chrsterton I had yet to see. It is Chesterton, alright, but it is like him in eclipse. I had only been seeing the full moon through his works like Heretics, Orthodoxy, The Defendant, Tremendous Trifles, and Manalive. This is the dark side of Chesterton (implied in The Man Who Was Thursday), not evil but the side that seldom one wonders for its darkness is taken as nothingness. The foreword of this edition provided by Marie Smith is excellent and gentles you into a different kind of Chesterton, paradox if you will.
December 11, 2021
This collection is certainly not the best of Chesterton, but I find a lot of enjoyment even in these lesser works. His writing style is of the rare sort where you feel like you have gotten to know him just by reading his stories, and he's a joy to know. For the most part at least.
The best part of this collection is that the works herein presage the much better books that Chesterton wrote later in his career. For instance, A Picture of Tuesday (1896) is focused on something expanded upon in the finale of The Man Who Was Thursday (1908). Homesick at Home (1896) is a depiction of the same idea that a part of Manalive (1912) depicted to better effect. The discussion of the architecture of St. Paul's Cathedral in A Nightmare (1907) is a clear precursor to a similar discussion in The Ball and The Cross (1909). Chivalry Begins at Home (1925) was published long after The Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904), but the starkly contrary conclusions are an interesting juxtaposition. As a huge fan of Chesterton, it was certainly interesting to read these early renditions of Chesterton’s ideas.
Another highlight of this collection is that Chesterton took these very short stories as an opportunity to explore tones that are vastly different than what you find in his longer works. The stories The Angry Street and On Secular Education in particular are both almost Kafkaesque, though they reference spirituality and religion more explicitly than Kafka ever did. Other stories have stronger tinges of science fiction than you find in Chesterton’s books. I doubt most readers will get much pleasure from these small things, but I enjoyed seeing stories that showcased a slightly expanded range for one of my favorite authors.
The collection is not without some serious problems, however. As previously mentioned, these stories just aren’t top-tier Chesterton, the best only serving as stepping stones to his better work. Additionally, Chesterton’s flaw of worshiping tradition because it’s tradition and being suspicious of the new just because it’s new, a flaw that persisted throughout his prolific career, is on full display in these stories. This is especially true in The Conversion of an Anarchist, wherein a contrarian man that loves everything modern completely reverses all of his beliefs over the course of a single evening when he’s confronted with the fact that other contrarians are annoying. But even in a bad Chesterton short story there’s a grain of truth: contrarians are annoying.
This collection is something I could only recommend to die-hard Chesterton fans, but that’s also the only group of people who are at all likely to consider reading it. Even if Chesterton is your favorite, though, go into this one with reasonable expectations. These works have that Chesterton charm, but not in great enough quantities to disguise the fact that they’re only okay. 3/5.
The best part of this collection is that the works herein presage the much better books that Chesterton wrote later in his career. For instance, A Picture of Tuesday (1896) is focused on something expanded upon in the finale of The Man Who Was Thursday (1908). Homesick at Home (1896) is a depiction of the same idea that a part of Manalive (1912) depicted to better effect. The discussion of the architecture of St. Paul's Cathedral in A Nightmare (1907) is a clear precursor to a similar discussion in The Ball and The Cross (1909). Chivalry Begins at Home (1925) was published long after The Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904), but the starkly contrary conclusions are an interesting juxtaposition. As a huge fan of Chesterton, it was certainly interesting to read these early renditions of Chesterton’s ideas.
Another highlight of this collection is that Chesterton took these very short stories as an opportunity to explore tones that are vastly different than what you find in his longer works. The stories The Angry Street and On Secular Education in particular are both almost Kafkaesque, though they reference spirituality and religion more explicitly than Kafka ever did. Other stories have stronger tinges of science fiction than you find in Chesterton’s books. I doubt most readers will get much pleasure from these small things, but I enjoyed seeing stories that showcased a slightly expanded range for one of my favorite authors.
The collection is not without some serious problems, however. As previously mentioned, these stories just aren’t top-tier Chesterton, the best only serving as stepping stones to his better work. Additionally, Chesterton’s flaw of worshiping tradition because it’s tradition and being suspicious of the new just because it’s new, a flaw that persisted throughout his prolific career, is on full display in these stories. This is especially true in The Conversion of an Anarchist, wherein a contrarian man that loves everything modern completely reverses all of his beliefs over the course of a single evening when he’s confronted with the fact that other contrarians are annoying. But even in a bad Chesterton short story there’s a grain of truth: contrarians are annoying.
This collection is something I could only recommend to die-hard Chesterton fans, but that’s also the only group of people who are at all likely to consider reading it. Even if Chesterton is your favorite, though, go into this one with reasonable expectations. These works have that Chesterton charm, but not in great enough quantities to disguise the fact that they’re only okay. 3/5.
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July 27, 2013"When I saw her something stirred within me like the memory of a previous existence."
"My dear sir, adventure is a great thing, a glorious thing; and why? Because it kills off adventurous people."
"My dear sir, adventure is a great thing, a glorious thing; and why? Because it kills off adventurous people."
October 5, 2022
A pretty hard slog. There's a reason these pieces are uncollected. My belief that I might be a GK Chesterton completist has been successfully challenged.
'The Taming of the Nightmare' stood out as the best story. Intriguingly, it's thought to have been written in 1892, when the author was 18; if that's correct, it seems to be the earliest work in this book. There are other pieces I remember liking but barely remember, as they were very short, and I read many of them months ago. As a (now) near-GKC-completist, it is good to have read those.
Lots of the stories come from GK's Weekly, a publication edited by GKC. It's easy to imagine the editor of a weekly magazine occasionally throwing a few pages of dross into it to avoid having to sell blank pages. And now here they are, preserved in fine hardcovers.
'The Taming of the Nightmare' stood out as the best story. Intriguingly, it's thought to have been written in 1892, when the author was 18; if that's correct, it seems to be the earliest work in this book. There are other pieces I remember liking but barely remember, as they were very short, and I read many of them months ago. As a (now) near-GKC-completist, it is good to have read those.
Lots of the stories come from GK's Weekly, a publication edited by GKC. It's easy to imagine the editor of a weekly magazine occasionally throwing a few pages of dross into it to avoid having to sell blank pages. And now here they are, preserved in fine hardcovers.
April 30, 2019
While this collection contains some hard-to-find pieces and some outright gems such as The Angry Street, this book is hardly a "best of" Chesterton as it claims. In content it is in the same vein as Chesterton's other work. The idea that a darker side is revealed only here is ludicrous as anyone who has read Chesterton's other stories will see that the same "darker side" is present throughout his work. Despite this, it is a must for all Chestertonians though because some of these pieces are not collected elsewhere. If you're new to Chesterton check out The Innocence of Father Brown, The Club of Queer Trades, The Napoleon of Notting Hill, The Man Who Knew Too Much, or Tremendous Trifles (or all of the above, or more!) instead and come back to this much later.
January 5, 2018
I read somewhere (maybe from Alan Jacobs) that sometimes Chesterton takes getting used to. I found this to be somewhat true for me. This is the first book by him that I have read and my favorite stories were at the end -- which is not usual in short story compilations in my experience. Therefore, I am going to tentatively attribute this phenomenon to the fact that I have become more familiar with his writing style, increasing my enjoyment.
On the subject of short story collections -- does anyone know who decides the order of the stories? The author or the editor? Is there a 'method' to their order or is it completely random?
On the subject of short story collections -- does anyone know who decides the order of the stories? The author or the editor? Is there a 'method' to their order or is it completely random?
September 19, 2017
Daylight and Nightmare is a veritable grab bag of stories by one of Britain's greatest writers, containing fables, fairy tales, fantasy, and even stories which might qualify as dystopian or science fiction. If you're looking for something different to pass the day's idle minutes, give this collection a try.
August 3, 2018
3.5
Very theologically-heavy fables and stories. I really enjoyed most of the ones I read, but they're a little too heavy-handed for me. I think I will try his theology because clearly that is his first love. (Although I will certainly also try as Mysteries, for which he is also famous.)
Very theologically-heavy fables and stories. I really enjoyed most of the ones I read, but they're a little too heavy-handed for me. I think I will try his theology because clearly that is his first love. (Although I will certainly also try as Mysteries, for which he is also famous.)
March 17, 2022
This is an excellent example of Chesterton. Some of the stories are too over the top, which is hard to get for Chesterton. But others land so perfectly on top that you can't help but love even his short and seemingly random works.
August 26, 2008
One of my favorite literary forms, from one of my favorite writers! What really struck me about this book was Chesterton's amazing creativity, sometimes to the point of the bizarre and even absurd. He often twists a concept or truth completely inside out to highlight it with its own absurdity.
April 19, 2016
Every story in this collection sparkles with imagination and insight. Light and charming, but no less engaging and thought-invoking than artistically penned, affording any reader hours of pleasant thought between chapters.
October 2, 2014
Short and rather delightful combination of stories, fables, and fairy tales. Entirely worth reading for anyone who enjoys Chesterton.
July 22, 2025
Cracking good fun! and good thought. And good stories.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews