Catholic Literary Theory

Catholic Literary Theory is the idea that truths about human experience and identity are inherent to art and literature, whatever its source. We can and should bring forth these truths by analysis, to help us understand and articulate the human person and destiny. This analysis, however, is not the only form of knowing - it leads back to the power and paradox of art, so we may receive more deeply its unique expression. The beauty we find liberates the soul, transports us beyond our insatiable thirst for something outside the confines of space and time, and is a participation in the creator and giver of beauty.

Down at the Docks, by Kenneth Koch

The Cathedral, by Auguste Rodin

if i believe, by ee cummings

The Lamb and The Tyger, by William Blake

Son of Man, by René Magritte

Concert for Anarchy, by Rebecca Horn

Hermit Songs, by Samuel Barber and Anonymous

The Lee Shore (Ch. 23 of Moby Dick), by Herman Melville

Full Fathom Five, by Sylvia Plath

A Thousand Silent Moments (Rainforest), by Anila Quayyum Agha

Beowulf, by Anonymous

If I Had Grown Up in a Land Where Days, by Ranier Maria Rilke

You Are the Future, the Great Sunrise Red, by Ranier Maria Rilke

The Lion for Real, by Allen Ginsberg

Evening Star, by William Turner

The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett

The Hollow Men, by T. S. Eliot

The House With the Cracked Walls, by Paul Cézanne

States of Transmutation, by Andrea Peña

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