As wide a following as the late Thomas Merton had while he lived, ever since his tragic accidental death in Bangkok in 1968. there has been a steady upsurge of interest in both his life and writings.A priest and Trappist monk by vocation, his theological works have been instrumental in reforming Western monasticism and in carrying on the religious dialog botanist and West; and enormously productive poet, his poems display an astonishing technical versatility and deeply felt humanity. Merton's stature as a critic, however, was not fully appreciated until the publication n 1981 of the first collection of his distinct literary essays, now available as a paperbook.

Acknowledgments	p. ix
Introduction	p. xi
Blake and the New Theology	p. 3
News of the Joyce Industry	p. 12
A Footnote from Ulysses: Peace and Revolution	p. 23
The True Legendary Sound: the Poetry and Criticism of Edwin Muir	p. 29
The Pasternak Affair	p. 37
Pasternak's Letters to Georgian Friends	p. 84
"Baptism in the Forest": Wisdom and Initiation in William Faulkner	p. 92
Faulkner and His Critics	p. 117
"To Each His Darkness": Notes on a Novel of Julien Green	p. 124
Louis Zukofsky-the Paradise Ear	p. 128
The Answer of Minerva: Pacifism and Resistance in Simone Weil	p. 134
Roland Barthes-Writing as Temperature	p. 140
J. F. Powers- Morte D'Urban: Two Celebrations	p. 147
William Styron- Who is Nat Turner?	p. 152
Flannery O'Connor-a Prose Elegy	p. 159
The Trial of Pope Pius Xii: Rolf Hochhuth's the Deputy	p. 162
William Melvin Kelleythe Legend of Tucker Caliban	p. 168
The Plague of Albert Camus: a Commentary and Introduction	p. 181
Camus: Journals of the Plague Years	p. 218
Terror and the Absurd: Violence and Nonviolence in Albert Camus	p. 232
Prophetic Ambiguities: Milton and Camus	p. 252
Camus and the Church	p. 261
Three Saviors in Camus: Lucidity and the Absurd	p. 275
The Stranger: Poverty of an Antihero	p. 292
Rubén Dario	p. 305
Raissa Maritain	p. 307
Fernando Pessoa	p. 309
César Vallejo	p. 310
Alfonso Cortes	p. 311
Rafael Alberti	p. 313
Jorge Carrera Andrade	p. 318
Pablo Antonio Cuadra	p. 321
Ernesto Cardenal	p. 323
Poetry, Symbolism and Typology	p. 327
Poetry and Contemplation: a Reappraisal	p. 338
Theology of Creativity	p. 355
Message to Poets	p. 371
Answers on Art and Freedom	p. 375
Why Alienation is for Everybody	p. 381
Preface	p. 391
Background and Development	p. 393
Blake's Ideas on the Place of Nature in Art	p. 424
Bibliography	p. 452
Huxley and the Ethics of Peace	p. 457
Standards for Critics	p. 462
Realism and Adventure	p. 464
in Praise of Books	p. 466
in Defense of Art	p. 468
Love of Change for Its Own Sake	p. 470
Restaging the Republic	p. 472
John Skelton, Scholar, Poet and Satirist	p. 474
a Spirited Debate on Poetry	p. 476
Background of Romanticism	p. 479
That Old Dilemma of Good and Evil	p. 481
The Art of Richard Hughes	p. 483
D. H. Lawrence: Who Saw Himself as a Messiah	p. 488
Huxley's Pantheon	p. 490
Time and Unburdening and the Recollection of the Lamb: the Easter Service in Faulkner's the Sound and the Fury	p. 497
Faulkner Meditations: the Wild Palms	p. 515
Index	p. 537
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