The Man Who was Thursday

Product Description

Widely considered as Chesterton's masterpiece, "The Man Who Was Thursday" defies classification. Subtitled "A nightmare" by Chesterton, on one level it is a fast-moving and surreal detective story. Drawing on contemporary fears of anarchist conspiracies and bomb outrages, it is firmly rooted in time and place in turn-of-the-century London — but it also defies temporal boundaries. Police Detective Syme finds himself drawn into a world that seems to have gone beyond humanity when he is elected 'Thursday', one of the members of the Central European Council of seven monarchs (each named after a day of the week). Dreamlike, prophetic, and frequently funny, the novel attacks contemporary pessimism and, through a bizarre series of pursuits and unmaskings, returns Syme —and us — to earth more aware of its beauty, promise, and creative potential.

This edition of Chesterton's masterpiece explicates and enriches the complete text with extensive footnotes, together with an introductory essay on the metaphysical meaning of Chesterton's profound allegory. Martin Gardner sees the novel's anarchists as symbols of our God-given free will, and the mysterious Sunday as representing Nature, with its strange mixture of good and evil when considered as distinct from God, as a mask hiding the transcendental face of the creator. The book also includes a bibliography listing the novel's many earlier editions and stage dramatizations, as well as numerous illustrations that further illuminate the text. Illustrated