He knew Chesterton’s works, but admitted that Chesterton is not taught at Trinity.
REGINA: How did Chesterton feel about the Irish?
AHLQUIST: Chesterton was a great champion of the Irish, and they knew it and loved him for it. The Irish poet Maurice Leahy said that most Irish consider G.K. Chesterton to be an Irishman and George Bernard Shaw to be an Englishman.
Chesterton always argued for Irish home rule, and admired the Irish for their wit, resilience, and love for faith and family. The people of Ireland honored Chesterton by donating the church bell for the bell tower in Chesterton’s church in Beaconsfield, England, as a memorial to him.
REGINA: How did his fellow Englishmen respond to his Irish sentiments?
AHLQUIST: I would say that most English intellectuals knew Chesterton was right, but they kept quiet about it. No one ever stepped forward to argue with him about his position on Ireland, as they would argue with him on economics or religion.
Politicians, however, had to make an effort to studiously ignore Chesterton, who was their most faithful critic.
REGINA: So many of GK’s writings have not only stood the test of time, but also have proven prophetic in many ways. Is this true of his writings about the Irish, as well?
AHLQUIST: Chesterton says that the Irish national spirit is always living because it is always dying. That sounds timely. And although it is not specifically a prophecy about the Irish, Chesterton was talking about Ireland when he said that every political question is ultimately a religious question.
REGINA: “The great Gaels of Ireland are the men that God made mad, For all their wars are merry, and all their songs are sad.” Would Chesterton say the same thing today?
AHLQUIST: In general yes, because Chesterton speaks in generalizations. There may be some sadness in their fighting these days and some shallow cackling in their contemporary music, but the Irish will not be satisfied with sad fighting and happy singing.
REGINA: What is there of value to us as Americans today in GK’s “Irish Impressions”?
AHLQUIST: The three main themes apply to Americans today: the natural virtue of patriotism, the importance of the family as the basic unit of society, and danger of irreligion that makes men passive.
REGINA: Did you attend Mass while you were in Ireland? Your impressions?
AHLQUIST: The churches that I visited in Ireland were ruins, destroyed by the English 500 years ago. In spite of their being piles of rock, they still are sacred places.
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And for our readers seeking some lesser-known gem to discover?
I recommend The Illustrated London News essays (which are part of the Collected Works published by Ignatius Press), and if you have access to a good library, the Daily News essays (published by Pickering and Chatto). And then there is Gilbert magazine, published by the American Chesterton Society, like this gem from 1930: “When people begin to ignore human dignity, it will not be long before they begin to ignore human rights.”
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