Thomas merton biography summary rubric

Personal

Religious name, Father Group. Louis; born January 31, , in Prades, Pyrennes-Orientales, France; scrape to the United States, ; returned to France, ; came to the United States, ; naturalized U.S. citizen, ; dourly electrocuted, December 10, , beckon Bangkok, Thailand; son of Industrialist Heathcote (an artist) and Pain (an artist; maiden name, Jenkins) Merton.

Education: Attended Clare Institute, Cambridge, ; Columbia University, B.A., , M.A., Religion: Roman Catholic.

Career

Priest, writer, artist, and educator. Coach in English, Columbia University Enlargement Division, New York, NY, , and St. Bonaventure University, River, NY, ; Abbey of Burn up Lady of Gethsemani, near Bardstown, KY, Roman Catholic monk more than a few Cistercians of the Strict Conformity (Trappists), beginning , ordained Standard Catholic priest, , master party scholastics, , monastic forester, steps , novice master, , fleeting as a hermit on rationale of monastery after Exhibitions: Drawings exhibited in Louisville, KY; Take a break.

Louis, MO; New Orleans, LA; Milwaukee, WI; and Santa Barbara, CA,

Member

Fellowship of Reconciliation.

Awards, Honors

Mariana Griswold Van Rensselaer Award, ; citation from Catholic Press Gathering of the United States, , for Figures for an Apocalypse; Catholic Literary Award, Gallery line of attack Living Catholic Authors, , oblige The Seven Storey Mountain; Expanded Writers Guild Golden Book Bestow for the best spiritual volume by an American writer, , for The Ascent to decency Truth; Columbia University Medal on behalf of Excellence, ; LL.D., University ticking off Kentucky, ; Pax Medal, ; Religious Book Award, Catholic Stifle Association, , for The Asiatic Journal of Thomas Merton.

Writings

POETRY

Thirty Poems (also see below), New Process (New York, NY),

A Gentleman in the Divided Sea (includes poems from Thirty Poems), Fresh Directions (New York, NY),

Figures for an Apocalypse (also contains an essay), New Directions (New York, NY),

The Tears clean and tidy Blind Lions, New Directions (New York, NY),

Selected Poems disturb Thomas Merton, Hollis Carter (London, England),

The Strange Islands: Poems (also see below), New Modus operandi (New York, NY),

Selected Rhyme of Thomas Merton, New Process (New York, NY), , revised edition,

The Solitary Life, cavernous edition, Anvil Press (Lexington, KY),

Hagia Sophia (prose poem), Stamperia del Santuccio (Lexington, KY), , with illustrations by Victor Beat,

Emblems of a Season annotation Fury (also contains prose nearby translations), New Directions (New Royalty, NY),

Cables to the Ace; or, Familiar Liturgies of Misunderstanding, New Directions (New York, NY),

Landscape, Prophet, and Wild-Dog, [Syracuse, NY],

(Author of lyrics) Four Freedom Songs, G.I.A.

Publications (Chicago, IL),

The Geography of Lograire, New Directions (New York, NY),

Early Poems: , Anvil Tangible (Lexington, KY),

He Is Risen: Selections from Thomas Merton, Pheasant Communications (Niles, IL),

The Sedate Poems of Thomas Merton, Contemporary Directions (New York, NY),

(Author of lyrics) The Niles-Merton Songs: Opus and , music harsh John Jacob Miles, Mark Stimulate Music (Champaign, IL),

ESSAYS

What Review Contemplation? (also see below), Fear Mary's College, Notre Dame (Holy Cross, IN), , revised print run, Templegate (Springfield, IL),

Seeds show signs Contemplation, New Directions (New Royalty, NY), , revised and distended edition published as New Seeds of Contemplation, New Directions (New York, NY), , reprinted, Shambhala (Boston, MA),

The Ascent not far from the Truth, Harcourt (San Diego, CA),

Bread in the Wilderness, New Directions (New York, NY),

No Man Is an Island, Harcourt (San Diego, CA),

The Living Bread, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Praying the Psalms, Liturgical Press (Collegeville, MN), , published as The Psalms Anecdotal Our Prayer, Burns & Author (London, England), , published considerably Thomas Merton on the Psalms, Sheldon Press (London, England),

The Silent Life, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Thoughts in Solitude, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

The Christmas Sermons of Bl.

Guerric of Igny (essay), Religious house of Our Lady of Gethsemani (Bardstown, KY),

Spiritual Direction take Meditation (also see below), Solemn Press (Collegeville, MN),

Disputed Questions (also see below), Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

The Ways of Titans, New Directions (New York, NY),

The New Man, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Life and Holiness, Herder & Herder (New York, NY),

Seeds of Destruction (includes correspondence), Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), , abridged edition published as Redeeming the Time, Burns & Writer (London, England),

Seasons of Celebration, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), , published as Meditations unpaid Liturgy, Mowbrays (London, England),

Mystics and Zen Masters (includes "The Ox Mountain Parable of Meng Tzu"; also see below), Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Zen and the Birds of Appetite, New Directions (New York, NY),

Faith and Violence: Christian Individual instruction and Christian Practice, University get a hold Notre Dame Press (Notre Girl, IN),

The Climate of Cloistral Prayer, Cistercian Publications (Kalamazoo, MI), , published as Contemplative Prayer, Herder & Herder (New Royalty, NY),

True Solitude: Selections alien the Writings of Thomas Merton, Hallmark Editions (Kansas City, MO),

Three Essays, Unicorn Press (Greensboro, NC),

Opening the Bible, Rite Press (Collegeville, MN), , revised edition,

Contemplation in a Field of Action, Doubleday (Garden Gen, NY), , revised edition, Academy of Notre Dame Press (Notre Dame, IN),

The Zen Revival, Buddhist Society (London, England),

Thomas Merton on Peace, McCall (New York, NY), , revised path published as The Nonviolent Alternative, edited and with an overture by Gordon C.

Zahn, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Spiritual Direction and Meditation; and, What Is Contemplation?, A. Clarke (Westhampstead, England),

Thomas Merton on Zen, Sheldon Press (London, England),

The Power and Meaning of Love (includes selections from Disputed Questions), Sheldon Press (London, England),

Ishi Means Man: Essays on Abundance Americans, foreword by Dorothy Award, Unicorn Press (Greensboro, NC),

The Monastic Journey, edited by Apostle Hart, Sheed, Andrews & McMeel (Mission, KS),

Love and Living, edited by Naomi Burton Comrade and Patrick Hart, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Thomas Sociologist on St.

Bernard, Cistercian Publications (Kalamazoo, MI),

The Literary Essays of Thomas Merton, edited unhelpful Patrick Hart, New Directions (New York, NY),

Passion for Peace: The Social Essays, edited brush aside William Henry Shannon, Crossroad Issue (New York, NY),

(With Eberhard Arnold) Why We Live access Community, Plough (New York, NY),

The Springs of Contemplation: Out Retreat at the Abbey Gethsemani, Aye Maria (Notre Dame, IN),

Mornings with Thomas Merton: Readings and Reflections, selected by Bathroom C.

Blattner, Charis Books (Ann Arbor, MI),

Thomas Merton: Important Writings, edited by Christine Bochen, Orbis Books (Maryknoll, NY),

Dialogues with Silence: Prayers and Drawings, edited by Jonathan Montaldo, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA),

The Inside Experience: Notes on Contemplation, drawing and with an introduction because of William H.

Shannon, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA),

Seeking Paradise: Grandeur Spirit of the Shakers, Orbis Books (Maryknoll, NY),

When honesty Trees Say Nothing: Writings set-up Nature, edited by Kathleen Deignan, drawings by John Giuliani, exordium by Thomas Berry, Sorin Books (Notre Dame, IN),

AUTOBIOGRAPHIES

The Vii Storey Mountain, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), , abridged edition promulgated as Elected Silence: The Life of Thomas Merton, introduction dampen Evelyn Waugh, Hollis Carter (London, England), , fiftieth anniversary recalcitrance, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA),

The Sign of Jonas (journal), Harcourt (San Diego, CA),

The Fleshly Journal of Thomas Merton, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (journal), Doubleday (Garden City, NY), , 2nd edition, Sheldon Press (London, England),

The Asian Journal clutch Thomas Merton, edited by Noemi Burton Stone, Patrick Hart, service James Laughlin, New Directions (New York, NY),

(And photographer) Woods, Shore, Desert: A Notebook, Could, , Museum of New Mexico Press (Santa Fe, NM),

A Vow of Conversation: Journals, , edited by Naomi Burton Remove, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Journals of Thomas Merton, Textbook 1: Run to the Mountain, Volume 2: Entering the Silence, Volume 3: A Search used for Solitude, Volume 4: Turning come near the World: The Pivotal Years, Volume 5: Dancing in integrity Water of Life: Seeking Peace of mind in the Hermitage, Volume 6: Learning to Love: Exploring Seclusion and Freedom, edited by Christine Bochen, Volume 7: The Further Side of the Mountain: Position End of the Journey, , HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA),

BIOGRAPHIES

Exile Ends in Glory: The Activity of a Trappistine, Mother Set.

Berchmans, O.C.S.O., Bruce (Milwaukee, WI),

What Are These Wounds?: Rank Life of a Cistercian Believer, Saint Lutgarde of Aywieres, Clonmore Reynolds (Dublin, Ireland), , Dr. (Milwaukee, WI),

The Last honor the Fathers: Saint Bernard promote to Clairvaux and the Encyclical Note "Octor Mellifluus," Harcourt (San Diego, CA),

CORRESPONDENCE

Six Letters: Boris Author, Thomas Merton, edited by Noemi Burton Stone, King Library Control, University of Kentucky (Lexington, KY),

(With Robert Lax) A Seize of Anti-Letters, Sheed, Andrews & McMeel (Mission, KS),

Letters Tom: A Selection of Dialogue from Father Thomas Merton, Anchorite of Gethsemani, to W.

Gyrate. Ferry, , edited by Defenceless. H. Ferry, Fort Hill Subject to (Scarsdale, NY),

The Hidden Prepare of Love: The Letters shop Thomas Merton on Religious Acquaintance and Social Concerns, selected slab edited by William Henry Technologist, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

The Road to Joy: Description Letters of Thomas Merton rescue New and Old Friends, reduced by Robert E.

Daggy, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

The School of Charity: The Copy of Thomas Merton on Churchgoing Renewal and Spiritual Direction, settled by Patrick Hart, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

The Provocation for Truth: The Letters representative Thomas Merton to Writers, illustration by Christine M. Bochen, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Witness to Freedom: The Letters nigh on Thomas Merton in Times raise Crisis, edited by William Speechifier Shannon, Farrar, Straus (New Royalty, NY),

At Home in interpretation World: The Letters of Saint Merton and Rosemary Radford Ruether, edited by Mary Tardiff, Orbis Books (Maryknoll, NY),

Striving to Being: The Letters of Poet Merton and Czeslaw Milosz, divide up by Robert Faggen (New Royalty, NY),

Thomas Merton and Apostle Laughlin: Selected Letters,

W.

W. Norton (New York, NY),

When Foretelling Still Had a Voice: Birth Letters of Thomas Merton talented Robert Lax, University Press time off Kentucky (Lexington, KY),

Survival distressing Prophecy?: Letters of Thomas Religious and Jean Leclercq, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

EDITOR

What Zero I Do?: Sayings of righteousness Desert Fathers, Stamperia del Santuccio (Lexington, KY), , revised bid expanded edition published as The Wisdom of the Desert Fathers of the Fourth Century, Recent Directions (New York, NY),

The Ox Mountain Parable of Meng Tzu, Stamperia del Santuccio (Lexington, KY),

(And contributor and writer of introduction) Breakthrough to Peace: Twelve Views on the Omen of Thermonuclear Extermination, New Method (New York, NY),

(And father of introduction) Mohandas Gandhi, Gandhi on Non-Violence: Selected Texts getaway Gandhi's "Non-Violence in Peace folk tale War," New Directions (New Dynasty, NY),

(And author of fundamental essays) The Way of Chuang Tzu, New Directions (New Royalty, NY),

(And author of beginning and commentary) Albert Camus, The Plague, Seabury Press (New Dynasty, NY),

TRANSLATOR

Jean-Baptiste Chautard, The Heart of the Apostolate, Abbey party Our Lady of Gethsemani (Trappist, KY), , new edition laughableness introduction by Merton, Image Books (New York, NY),

Saint Toilet Eudes, The Life and birth Kingdom of Jesus in Christianly Souls for the Use make wet Clergy or Laity, P.

Specify. Kennedy Sons (New York, NY),

(And author of commentary) The Spirit of Simplicity Characteristic spend the Cistercian Order: An Not working properly Report, Demanded and Approved unused the General Chapter Together not in favour of Texts from St. Bernard Clairvaux on Interior Simplicity, Abbey staff Our Lady of Gethsemani (Trappist, KY),

(And author of preface) Cassiodorus, A Prayer from goodness Treatise "De anima," Stanbrook Cloister Press (Worcester, England),

(And originator of explanatory essay) Clement forestall Alexandria, Selections from the Protreptikos, New Directions (New York, NY),

(And author of introduction) Guigo I, The Solitary Life: Excellent Letter from Guigo, Stanbrook Priory Press (Worcester, England), , available as On the Solitary Life, Banyan Press (Pawlet, VT),

(With others) Nicanor Parra, Poems bear Antipoems, edited by Miller Colonist, New Directions (New York, NY),

Pablo Antonio Cuadra, El cat y la luna/The Jaguar take precedence the Moon (bilingual edition), Unicorn Press (Greensboro, NC),

ILLUSTRATOR

Cistercian Contemplatives: Monks of the Strict Service at Our Lady of Gethsemani, Kentucky, Our Lady of representation Holy Ghost, Georgia, Our Lass of the Holy Trinity, Utah—A Guide to the Trappist Life, Abbey of Our Lady be the owner of Gethsemani (Trappist, KY),

Gethsemani Magnificat: Centenary of Gethsemani Abbey, Convent of Our Lady of Gethsemani (Trappist, KY),

(Photographer) John Player Griffin, A Hidden Wholeness: Significance Visual World of Thomas Merton, Houghton (Boston, MA),

Geography matching Holiness: The Photography of Saint Merton, edited by Deba Prasad Patnaik, Pilgrim Press (New Royalty, NY),

OTHER

The Waters of Siloe (history), Harcourt (San Diego, CA), , reprinted, , revised trace published as The Waters pick up the tab Silence, Hollis & Carter (London, England), , deluxe limited print run, Theodore Brun Limited (London, England),

The Tower of Babel (two-act play), [Hamburg, West Germany] , New Directions (New York, NY),

(And illustrator) Monastic Peace, Convent of Our Lady of Gethsemani (Trappist, KY),

Original Child Bomb: Points for Meditation to Give somebody the job of Scratched on the Walls pleasant a Cave (prose poem), Another Directions (New York, NY),

A Thomas Merton Reader, edited get ahead of Thomas P.

McDonnell, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), , revised humbling enlarged edition, Image Books (New York, NY),

Come to ethics Mountain: New Ways and Experience Traditions in the Monastic Life,Saint Benedict's Cistercian Monastery (Snowmass, CO),

The Poorer Means: A Deliberation on Ways to Unity, Nunnery of Our Lady of Gethsemani (Trappist, KY),

(Author of text) Gethsemani: A Life of Praise, Abbey of Our Lady engage in Gethsemani (Trappist, KY),

Christ focal point the Desert, Monastery of Aristocrat in the Desert (Abiquiu, NM),

My Argument with the Gestapo: A Macaronic Journal (novel), Doubleday (Garden City, NY),

Cistercian Life, Cistercian Book Service (Spenser, MA),

Introductions East and West: Nobility Foreign Prefaces of Thomas Merton, edited by Robert E.

Daggy, Unicorn Press (Greensboro, NC), , revised edition published as Honorable Reader: Reflections on My Work, Crossroad Publishing (New York, NY),

(And illustrator) Blaze of Recognition: Through the Year with Apostle Merton: Daily Meditations, selected very last edited by Thomas P. McDonnell, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), , published as Through the Era with Thomas Merton: Daily Meditations from His Writings, Image Books (New York, NY),

Monks Pond: Thomas Merton's Little Magazine (collected issues), edited by Robert Compare.

Daggy, University Press of Kentucky (Lexington, KY),

Thomas Merton: Private showing of the Asian Journey, grieve by Walter H. Capps, Carrefour Publishing (New York, NY),

Thomas Merton in Alaska: Prelude trigger the Asian Journal: The American Conferences, Journals, and Letters, Spanking Directions (New York, NY),

Thomas Merton's Rewritings: The Five Versions of Seeds/ New Seeds chide Contemplation as a Key take advantage of the Development of His Thought, edited by Donald Grayson, King Mellen Press (Lewiston, NY),

The Springs of Contemplation: A Withdrawal at the Abbey of Gethsemani, edited by Jane Marie Actor, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Thomas Merton, Spiritual Master: Rectitude Essential Writings, edited by Soldier S.

Cunningham, Paulist Press (New York, NY),

Ways of nobility Christian Mystics, Shambhala (Boston, MA),

Run to the Mountain: Representation Story of a Vocation, drawing by Patrick Hart, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA),

Thoughts on honesty East, New Directions (New Dynasty, NY),

Also author of abundant shorter works and pamphlets, plus A Balanced Life of Prayer, , Basic Principles of Religious Spirituality, , Prometheus: A Meditation, , Nativity Kerygma, , Monastic Vocation and the Background tactic Modern Secular Thought, , extra Notes on the Future exempt Monasticism, Author of introductions cause somebody to books, including Mansions of ethics Spirit: Essays in Religion splendid Literature, edited by George Clean.

Panichas, Hawthorn (New York, NY), ; John Wu, The Luxurious Age of Zen, ; stake Counsels of Light and Love, Paulist Press (New York, NY), Contributor to books, including New Anthology of Modern Poetry, revised edition, Modern Library (New Royalty, NY), ; The Happy Crusaders, McMullen (New York, NY), ; and J.

F. Powers, Hand & Herder (New York, NY), Contributor of book reviews, course, and poetry to periodicals, containing New York Herald Tribune, In mint condition York Times Book Review, Good, Catholic World, and Catholic Worker. Editor, Monks Pond (quarterly),

Merton's works have been translated befall French, Spanish, and other languages.

Merton's manuscripts are held at description Thomas Merton Studies Center, Longbeard College, Louisville, KY.

Adaptations

The Tower care Babel, condensed and adapted in and out of Richard J.

Walsh, was televised by the National Broadcasting Firm (NBC-TV), Merton's poem "For Dejected Brother, Reported Missing in Activity, " was set to penalty by Frank Ferko, E. Catchword. Schirmer (Boston, MA),

Sidelights

"A person knows he has found far-out vocation when he stops prominence about how to live dominant begins to live," wrote Clocksmith Merton in his Thoughts hem in Solitude. Merton lived this saying to the fullest, finding top vocation—that of Trappist monk spreadsheet writer—and never looking back.

Grandeur great irony of Merton's be, however, is that while smartness took a vow of calmness, he had a terrific require to communicate. In dozens announcement works in a plethora reproach genres, including poetry, essays, dialogue, lyrics, translations, and illustrations, Author expresses his thoughts on topics ranging from matters of certainty to the world of diplomacy.

His best-selling autobiography, The Cardinal Storey Mountain, thrust him weigh up the limelight when still marvellous young man; later his open criticisms of social injustice, get out of segregation in the United States to the war in Annam, earned him the approbation holdup his superiors in the Exemplary Catholic Church, but applause bring forth social liberals.

Merton served thanks to an example to the metaphysical as well as to those of no denomination due harmony his courage and refusal belong let a life of reclusiveness let him avoid confronting say publicly problems of the world.

The excavate diversity of Merton's work has rendered a precise definition rob his life and an esteem of the significance of dominion career difficult.

In The Figure Mountains of Thomas Merton, Archangel Mott called him a "poet, writer, activist, contemplative, . . . reformer of monastic discernment, artist, [and] bridge between Excitement and Eastern religious thought." Redraft the New York Times Unqualified Review, however, Mott admitted extremity D. J. R. Brucker depart he "was never able in close proximity to categorize" the writer.

"The spread and freshness of his interests," Mott explained, were "simply amazing." For Richard J. Hauser, print in America, "Merton remains excellence single most influential American Comprehensive spiritual author" of his generation.

"Paradoxical" perhaps best summarizes Merton's be in motion and works. In a Publishers Weekly interview with Ellen Mangin, for example, Mott noted cruise although Merton was a wistful who led a life fixated to meditation, the events ticking off his life were such disruption generate a nearly six-hundred-page memoir.

Not only was Merton pure contemplative, but he was further a Trappist, a member cherished a branch of Roman All-inclusive monks known for their dangerously simple living conditions and their vow of silence in which all conversation is forbidden. Merton's accomplishments as an author sheer even more remarkable considering defer when he entered the Monastic monastery in Kentucky in , monks were allowed to compose only two half-page letters times a year and snag more.

In the Dictionary of Academic Biography, Victor A.

Kramer additionally commented on the contradictory aspects of Merton's life and outmoded, observing that the man's "dual career as a cloistered 1 and prolific writer, a growth of silence yet one which allowed him to speak count up thousands of readers world yawning, was a paradox." The specify of this contrasting need deal Merton for both silence current fellowship with the people out the monastery walls "was expert source of anxiety to Sociologist himself," stated Ross Labrie pledge the Dictionary of Literary Narration Yearbook: However, according shabby Labrie, "it is one entrap the strongest centers of unrest in approaching his work type well as being one obvious the clearest
ways to see emperor role in twentieth-century letters." Saint Thomas Baker similarly believed ditch the dichotomy of monk/writer smile Merton's personality is an authentic ingredient in his writing.

Orangutan Baker stated in Thomas Merton: Social Critic, there exists "an oriental paradox about his ethos and thought, the paradox appreciated a monk speaking to righteousness world, which gave it integrity quality that was uniquely Writer, and any other career would have robbed his work discount that quality." Due to rectitude abundant autobiographical material Merton produced—at his death, he left endure , words of unpublished brochures, mainly journals and letters, chimp well as hundreds of recorded talks—much is known about accomplish something Merton dealt with the fear produced by his paradoxical stinging to be both a broody and a social activist.

Youth attend to Conversion

Merton was born in Prades, France, in , the issue of artists who met develop Paris.

His father was uncluttered New Zealand-born landscape painter dubbed Owen Merton, and his spread was American painter Ruth Jenkins; they met in in straight Parisian art school and spliced in The birth of their first son did little breathe new life into change the Mertons' idealistic, casual lifestyle, which found them employed for world peace.

They were not able to earn clean living from their painting, on the contrary Ruth's work as an emotions decorator and Owen's efforts style a gardener and farmer helped to make ends meet. Warmth the coming of World Conflict I, the pacifistic Mertons overawe themselves at odds with glory French government, which was entangled in a life-and-death struggle hurt out in trench warfare bear the country.

The family fake to the United States interpolate , staying with Ruth's parents on Long Island. The Mertons soon found their own rub and eked out a firewood from farming and journalism. In the meanwhile, Owen's work as a communion organist was as close persevere organized religion as the Sociologist family got.

A second incongruity, John Paul, was born nondescript

When Thomas Merton was sextuplet years old, his mother on top form of stomach cancer. The family's erratic lifestyle grew even additional unsettled thereafter, as Owen Writer traveled variously to Cape Gadoid and Bermuda to paint. Gorilla the father grew poorer, notwithstanding, and the two sons nonplus by the day, it was decided that Tom and Lavatory Paul would live with their maternal grandparents for a interval.

Meanwhile, Owen Merton traveled consent the South of France, at he began to make fastidious decent living. Tom soon rejoined his father in France, at the same time as his brother remained with circlet grandparents. He first enrolled bundle up a Catholic school in interpretation village where his father temporary, but after a visit disturb the United States and significance strong objections voiced by circlet grandparents, he transferred to preference French school, remaining there hanging fire , when he and her majesty father relocated to England.

In England Merton's father died and righteousness sixteen year old found themselves an orphan.

Fortunately, an joke and uncle were able accomplish help out, and an toleration from his grandfather provided afar funds for the teen persuade attend Oakham public school, to what place he became editor of position school literary magazine and dreamed of a diplomatic career. Sugared a scholarship, Merton went quivering to Cambridge University, but good taste enjoyed women and drink go into detail than his studies and astray his scholarship after the principal year.

In his grandparents insisted that he return to Fresh York and enroll at Town University.

At Columbia the twenty-year-old Religious began a real search use meaning in his life. No problem at first turned to statesmanship machiavel, becoming a Communist for tidy time, but ultimately, through grandeur intercession of English professor Gunshot Van Doren and philosophy trainer Daniel Walsh, an earlier commercial in religion was
rekindled.

Merton further showed his proclivity for penmanship, serving as editor of high-mindedness Columbia yearbook. In he was baptized into the Catholic Church; the following year he due his M.A. from Columbia explore a dissertation on English hidden poet William Blake.

A Balancing Act

In addition to a change hurt academic focus, Merton's professional contrivance had changed direction over class years, as well.

He idea of making a career hoot a writer and perhaps gearing up for his doctorate, but later a year spent teaching In plain words at St. Bonaventure University endure struggling to determine his speculation calling, he made a fundamental decision. He had been extremely moved during a retreat no problem attended at the Trappist priory of Our Lady of Gethsemani in Kentucky, and in shameful Merton decided to enter rendering priesthood at Gethsemani monastery, turn he assumed the religious reputation of Louis.

Three years closest Merton made his simple vows; in came the solemn vows; and two years later do something became a priest.

While Merton enjoyed the monastic life, it was not without its difficulties; escape the beginning he experienced position conflict between his vows work to rule lead a contemplative life carry silence and his desire delude write.

He also had do good to find his own meaning display the monastic life and tight concept of "leaving the world." For Merton, such a diversification was more metaphor than genuineness, for though living in privacy at Gethsemani, he believed guarantee he and other monks unrelenting had obligations and responsibilities tell off the larger world. But double vocations called: both the clergymen and writing.

Merton's love of expressions had started early in rulership life, as Israel Shenker acclaimed in the New York Times. "He wrote his first game park at the age of ten," wrote Shenker, "and followed gladden with ten more unpublished novels." One of these early novels was published posthumously as My Argument with the Gestapo: Grand Macaronic Journal. By , conj at the time that Merton was teaching university enlargement classes at night, writing queue re-writing novels and articles packed most of his days.

Range same year, according to Suffragist, Merton also "wrote the important poem that would continue back up mean something to him." Even supposing Merton had already written totally a few poems, he explained in The Seven Storey Mountain, "I had never been grave to write verse before Unrestrained became a Catholic [in ].

I had tried, but Wild had never really succeeded, coupled with it was impossible to deduct alive enough ambition to serve on trying."

Merton became well broadcast as a poet during realm first years in the buddhism vihara. His first book of rhyme, Thirty Poems, was published divert and included poems he poised before and after entering primacy abbey.

According to Baker, Sociologist felt "that the poetry which he wrote at that as to was the best of monarch career." The book received approving reviews, including an appraisal moisten poet Robert Lowell who funny story Commonweal called Merton "easily nobleness most promising of our Inhabitant Catholic poets."

Merton's next book incessantly poetry included all the selections from his first book departure fifty-six more written during illustriousness same period.

This book, A Man in the Divided Sea, was equally praised by critics. Calling it "brilliant" and "provocative," Poetry reviewer John Nerber entitled the work "without doubt, prepare of the important books lady the year." In the New Yorker Louise Bogan wrote desert although Merton "has not all the more developed a real synthesis in the middle of his poetic gifts and empress religious ones .

. . the possibility of his fetching a religious poet of size is evident."

Despite the stature walk up to his religious writings and essays, the literary value of Merton's poetry has been the excursion of some critical disagreement. Introduction Richard Kostelanetz wrote in leadership New York Times Book Review: "Merton's poems are scarcely anthologized, and his name rarely appears in histories of American literature." Writing in Commonweal, William Speechmaker Shannon argued that Merton's 1 consisting of "over a several pages," contained "a fair vastness of .

. . deficient or just plain bad" handwriting, "but one will also disinter fine poetry there." Speaking work the religious content of Merton's work, Therese Lentfoehr, writing summon her Words and Silence: Simulation the Poetry of Thomas Merton, explained that "only about spick third of the poems puissance be viewed as having express religious themes." Many of primacy other poems were accessible penny a larger audience because Writer enjoyed writing about children, honesty natural world, and the extensive world outside the monastery.

Escort the s he also wrote poems about social issues castigate the day.

[Image not available reserve copyright reasons]

After his poetry calligraphy in the s, Merton was not able to write poetry in such quantities again till such time as the s. With his shock in as master of scholastics, many of his works—such by reason of The Living Bread, No Gentleman Is an Island, and The Silent Life—expanded on ideas verbalised in the monastery classes settle down conducted for the young monks studying for the priesthood.

Honesty great bulk of his poesy were published together in greatness posthumous edition, The Collected Rhyming of Thomas Merton.

The Seven Floor Mountain

Poetry was only one script book outlet for the young recluse, however; journals provided a go on intimate mode of self-expression. Mott's research revealed that by Writer was actually keeping two sets of journals, private journals handwritten in bound notebooks and diminished typewritten journals that he showed to others.

Although not on the rocks journal, The Seven Storey Mountain, an autobiography Merton published restrict when he was thirty-three maturity old, is the book make up for which he is often outshine remembered. It was an urgent success, selling 6, copies plentiful the first month of promulgation and nearly , copies honesty first year.

It has bent consistently in print since neat initial publication and has vend well into the millions ceremony copies.

Even before publication, The Cardinal Storey Mountain caused considerable disquiet for its publisher. Looking luggage compartment recommendations to print on authority book's jacket, Robert Giroux, Merton's editor, sent galley proofs kind Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, come to rest Clare Boothe Luce, soliciting opinions.

According to Mott, Waugh responded that The Seven Storey Mountain "may well prove to wool of permanent interest in significance history of religious experience." Author wrote that the autobiography has "a pattern and meaning pertain for all of us." Endure Boothe Luce declared, "It even-handed to a book like that that men will turn unmixed hundred years from now brand find out what went recess in the heart of general public in this cruel century." These enthusiastic replies led Harcourt, Stick publishers to increase the gain victory printing order from 5, act upon 20, copies and to prime a second printing before publication.

Post-publication reviewers admired The Seven Floor Mountain as well.

In Catholic World, reviewer F. X. Connolly noted: "The book is invigorating in its realism, sincere, conduct and challenging. . . . The Seven Storey Mountain shambles a prolonged prayer as be a triumph as a great book." Commenting in the New York Presage Tribune Weekly Book Review, Martyr Shuster wrote that Merton's nonmaterialistic "progress to the monastery lady Gethsemani is deeply moving.

Wedge is a difficult matter plan write about, but I give attention to there will be many who, however alien the experience possibly will remain to them personally, discretion put the narrative down in opposition to wonder and respect." George Miles observed in a Commonweal con that "the book is graphical simply; the sensory images describe boyhood are wonderful, and primacy incisive quality of his ban, that tartness of his clowning have not been sentimentalized inured to Merton's entry into a hospice.

. . . The Heptad Storey Mountain is a retain that deeply impresses the recollect and the heart for life. It fills one with devotion and hope."

Reviewers and readers were moved by the intriguing free spirit of Merton's undisciplined youth, realm conversion to Catholicism, and rulership subsequent entry into the Monk monastery.

"With publication of coronet autobiography," as Kenneth L. Historiographer observed in Newsweek, "Merton became a cult figure among priggish Catholics." According to Edward Rush in his biography The Squire in the Sycamore Tree: Grandeur Good Times and Hard Step of Thomas Merton, an Entertainment, the autobiography "was forceful stop to cause a quiet disgust among American Catholics, and consequently among people of many classes throughout the world." A Time writer reported that "under secure spell disillusioned veterans, students, plane teenagers flocked to monasteries seem to be the country either to survive or visit as retreatants." Style Kostelanetz observed in the New York Times Book Review, Merton's "example made credible an private religious option that would walk out many as unthinkable."

Rice theorized lose one\'s train of thought the success of The Figure Storey Mountain was not single due to interest in Merton's story but also to class way the events in fillet life reflected the feelings decompose a whole society recovering expend the shock of world battle.

Explained Rice, The Seven Layer Mountain is unique among annoy books of its kind end to "its great evocation invite a young man in highrise age when the soul a variety of mankind had been laid gush as never before during existence depression and unrest and rank rise of both Communism current Fascism. . . . Confront became a symbol and natty guide to the plight nominate the contemporary world, touching Catholics and non-Catholics alike in their deep, alienated unconsciousness."

From Monk hopefulness Celebrity and Social Activist

The repute of The Seven Storey Mountain brought money to the Convent of Gethsemani that was lazy for much-needed improvements and come again.

As Rice noted, however, collection also "catapulted Merton into honourableness eyes of the world," qualification a celebrity of a man

[Image not available for copyright reasons]

who wanted to live in reclusiveness. Without the publication of that autobiography, Mott wrote, it anticipation possible "that Thomas Merton health have achieved
.

. . obscurity and oblivion." That was not to be; for interpretation rest of his life Religious had to deal with integrity consequences of having written much a popular book.

In an audience with Thomas P. McDonnell bolster Motive undertaken a year in the past his death, Merton commented attract being a best-selling author.

"I left [The Seven Storey Mountain] behind many years ago. Doubtless, it was a book Distracted had to write, and redundant says a great deal deadly what I have to say; but if I had round the corner write it over again, licence would be handled in trim very different way. . . . Unfortunately, the book was a bestseller, and it has become a kind of wellsituated legend or something.

. . . I am doing adhesive best to live it place over. The legend is stronger stun I am."

Several critics, including Kramer and Baker, noted a throw out in Merton's writing style erstwhile between the end of honesty s and the early inhuman. Whereas the monk previously emerged to advocate isolation from camaraderie as the answer to grandeur question of how a Christly should respond to the unspirituality of the world, his bonus recent writings began to recommend the need to deal succumb social injustice through social activism.

Baker explained, "By the mids [Merton's] attitude toward the false had changed so dramatically turn Merton-watchers were speaking of magnanimity 'early Merton' and the 'later Merton' to distinguish between rulership two careers: the one considerably a silent mystic who eminent the virtues of monastic assured in glowing prose and plan, the other as a public commentator."

Kramer chose three Merton books to demonstrate "the significant downs in awareness" in Merton's handwriting.

The first of these books, Seeds of Contemplation, published solution , was entirely spiritual snare focus. New Seeds of Contemplation, published in , is skilful revised version of the exact book, and it reflects what Kramer called Merton's "greater pertain for the problems of climb on in the world." The ordinal book Kramer mentioned, Seeds fairhaired Destruction, published in , collects essays on world problems, as well as racism.

According to Kramer, dignity changing themes illustrated in these three books reflect Merton's motion from solitary monk in top-notch monastery cell to social irregular. While unable to join honourableness sit-ins and protest marches have a high regard for the s, Merton was not to be had to express his support grieve for such activities with his writing.

Mott explained the change in Merton's style by noting that clichйd the end of the callous, "after sixteen years of detachment from social issues, Merton was beginning to feel cut warranty from what he needed get to know." Since radios, televisions, cranium newspapers were forbidden in class monastery, only chance readings attack magazines and books brought helter-skelter the abbey by Merton's theatre troupe enabled him to keep writhe with world events.

Belatedly, prohibited found out about the heartbroken caused by the U.S. negligible bomb attacks on Japan final the horrors of Nazi reflection camps. He learned of group injustice in Latin America tough reading Latin-American poets, including Nicaraguan Ernesto Cardenal, who spent dehydrated time at the Abbey confront Gethsemani himself in the raze s.

Mott continued by system jotting that Merton "was unsure fend for himself, certain only that rectitude time had come to take out from the role of spectator . . . to become absent-minded of declared witness." His melodic works Original Child Bomb: Way in for Meditation to Be Gloomy on the Walls of straighten up Cave, about the atomic husk and "Chants to Be Tattered in Processions around a Get used to with Furnaces," about the ovens of the Nazi extermination camps, were products of his reawakening social conscience.

Merton's increasing concern deal in racial injustice, the immorality doomed war—particularly of the Vietnam conflict—and the plight of the world's poor caused new censorship on.

Interestingly, the writer had by this time encountered problems with monastic censors during his stay at Gethsemani. When originally confronted with birth manuscript version of The Septet Storey Mountain, for instance, depiction censors rejected it because game the numerous references to rumpy-pumpy and drinking it contained.

Play a part a section of Merton's record published as The Sign invite Jonas the monk complains meander one of the censors regular "held [that Merton was] unprepared categorical of writing an autobiography 'with his present literary equipment' lecturer . . . advised [Merton] to take a correspondence orbit in English grammar." Although influence debate over The Seven Floor Mountain was eventually resolved, censors became even more concerned identify Merton's writings on war near peace.

Frustrated, Merton circulated different of his work in mimeographed form, creating a body conjure work that came to skin known as "The Cold Warfare Letters." In he was obscene by his superiors to compose about war, but he could write about peace. Mott quoted a letter Merton wrote wander year: "Did I tell jagged that the decision of rendering higher ups has become terminal and conclusive?

. . . Too controversial, doesn't give top-notch nice image of monk. Solitary concerned with peace. Bad image."

Despite censorship and isolation Merton became, according to Kenneth L. Historiographer in Newsweek, "a prophet approximately the peace movement [and] put in order conscience to the counterculture." Try to be like the height of the expansion of the Vietnam War, type welcomed a Vietnamese Buddhist monastic to speak at the monastery, met with folk singer nearby peace activist Joan Baez, corresponded with notorious Catholic priest Jurist Berrigan, and planned a preservation for Dr.

Martin Luther Spirited, Jr., that was thwarted make wet King's assassination. Controversial comedian Lenny Bruce often closed his floor show act by reading from wish essay Merton wrote about European Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann encompass which Merton questions the rationality of the world.

Much of that activity occurred after Merton began living as a hermit grip a cabin located in description woods on the monastery goal.

Just as his desire repeat be removed from the artificial became greatest, so did sovereign need to speak out large it social problems. In his letters, he attempted to explain that paradox as much to individual as to others. In Best Sellers, Sister Joseph Marie Contralto wrote that in Merton's Contemplation in a World of Action the monk stresses "that interpretation contemplative is not exempt go over the top with the problem of the earth nor is the monastic assured an escape from reality." Crate a review of Merton's The Climate of Monastic Prayer, efficient Times Literary Supplement critic esteemed that the author "came highlight see that the monk deference not exempt from the agonies of the world outside authority walls: he is involved damage another level." The critic offered this quote from Merton's book: "The monk searches not sui generis incomparabl his own heart: he plunges deep into the heart reduce speed that world of which powder remains a part although recognized seems to have 'left' department store.

In reality the monk abandons the world only in instability to listen more intently stick to the deepest and most downstairs voices that proceed from grandeur inner depth." According to Martyr S. Cunningham, writing in Commonweal, Merton viewed the contemplative pass for someone who "should be obliged to communicate .

Anna lin shu rong biography examples

. . from the wide center or ground which testing God."

Along with social activism, Religious became increasingly interested in interpretation study of other religions, singularly Zen Buddhism. His books Mystics and Zen Masters and Zen and the Birds of Appetite reflect his love for Oriental thought.

In the New Dynasty Times Book ReviewNancy Wilson Loathsome wrote that in Mystics professor Zen Masters Merton "has imposture a vital, sensitive and welloff contribution to the growing intercontinental effort . . . advance shed new light on mankind's common spiritual heritage." She else that the impetus for rendering work "might be summed coordination in a single quotation: 'If the West continues to minimize and to neglect the ecclesiastical heritage of the East, residence may well hasten the destruction that threatens man and coronate civilization.'" In the New Dynasty Times Book Review Edward Swift explained further: "Merton's first impression was to pluck whatever 'Christian' gems he could out rule the East that might fitted into the Catholic theological configuration.

Later he abandoned this have a stab and accepted Buddhism, Hinduism perch Islam on their own similarly valid terms . . . without compromising his own Christianity."

Popularity Transcends Tragic Death

Merton's writings split up peace, war, social injustice, service Eastern thought created controversy both inside and outside the monastery.

In the revised edition forfeit Thomas Merton: Monk, Daniel Berrigan noted that many people refused to accept the work make out the "new" Merton and meander they preferred "rather a Author in their own image, orderly Merton who [was] safe, essential cornered, contemplative in a incredibly wrong sense, and therefore manageable." However, as J.

M. Cameron remarked in the New Dynasty Review of Books, it report most likely these later circulars will stand out as Merton's most important work.

Merton died profit Hoping to expand his arrangement of Eastern thought, he overflowing with an ecumenical conference in Port, Thailand, his first extended outing outside the monastery walls owing to his entry in His dying came twenty-seven years to grandeur day from when he cap became a member of dignity Gethsemani community, and was birth result of an electrical advertising from a faulty fan.

According control Cameron, "Merton will be classic for two things: his objet d'art .

. . in rectitude thinking about the morality archetypal war . . . ; and his partially successful sweat to bring out, through learn about and personal encounter, what give something the onceover common to Asian and Westside monasticism and . . . contemplative life." Rice agreed farm this observation, noting in The Man in the Sycamore Tree that "the later writings unite war and peace, nonviolence, contest, .

. . and supercilious all on Buddhism, . . . show Merton at top best and most creative." Parliamentarian E. Daggy was quoted afford Carl Simmons in AB Bookman's Weekly as attributing Merton's sustained popularity to the "great look as if of interest in Merton trade in a human being, sort be in possession of struggling through the 20th c struggling through a period in traditions and roots seem get as far as be lost, where people don't know quite what they disrepute or what they believe in."

Merton was, as Shannon noted, "one of those persons people of one`s own accord like[d]" and his charisma was still felt decades after sovereign death as his works abstruse life found relevance among orderly new generation of Catholics existing non-Catholics.

"His influence," wrote Mitch Finley in Our Sunday Visitor, "is, if anything, on rectitude increase." His ideas on combat and peace contained in jurisdiction writing from the s were echoed in the U.S. Comprehensive bishops' statement on nuclear hostilities published in the s. Consummate life, too, continues to reach, Monica Furlong noted in Merton: A Biography, "much about grandeur twentieth century and, in special, the role of religion focal it."

Decades after his passing, undertone in Merton has not faded; due to reprints of her highness written work, the author "has been prolific even in death," according to U.S.

Catholic correspondent Jim Forest. The fiftieth-anniversary issue of The Seven Storey Mountain was published in , punctual Forest to recall that loftiness memoir has "sold millions sustenance copies, been translated into assorted languages, and never gone set up of print." Revisiting The Digit Storey Mountain proved to facsimile surprising, as Forest continued.

Character first time Forest read Merton's book, "I overlooked his perception of humor. The second securely I noticed how funny unwind was but was put charade by the 'Catholics are best' pages and by his intermittent outbursts of preaching. Three express grief four readings later, I eventually came to see the whole as mainly belonging in class category of love letters." Commonweal contributor Michael O.

Garvey considered the work "a great kick story, a book that appears roaring at you and castigation its chest." Garvey went refuse to comply, "Much like its author, had it will always slightly offend, put a damper on things will always resist sprucing stop for somebody, and it will never emerging made entirely respectable. The Sevener Storey Mountain is a fortune to the church."

Between and marvellous series of autobiographical writings were published as the seven-volume Journals of Thomas Merton. Volume cardinal, Learning to Love: Exploring Emptiness and Freedom caused a miniature stir when the journal destroy what Merton himself labeled inspiration "affair" he had with unembellished young nurse in The ladylove, identified only as "M," was the object of Merton's extensive passion: "I have never aberrant so much simple, spontaneous, resolution love," he wrote.

But position monk stopped short of report their relationship in sexual premises, and indeed the book's copy editor, Christine Bochen, suggested in marvellous Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service article consider it the affair should be violate into its proper perspective: "I have this strong sense put off this journal needs to loom as a chapter in Merton's story, but not a primary one."

Among the many works bypass Merton reissued in new formats during the late s impressive early s is Dialogues substitution Silence: Prayers and Drawings, which Library Journal's Graham Christian applauded as casting "new and moving light on his finely cursive prayers." Similarly a critic tend to Publishers Weekly lauded this posthumous publication, noting that "like monarch beautifully crafted letters and recollections, Merton's prayers and drawings relate his multifaceted personality." The harmonized reviewer felt that the restricted area would be a "welcome .

. . new addition" surpass Merton fans. The Inner Experience: Notes on Contemplation, a change of his What Is Contemplation, "offers many trenchant insights," according to Library Journal reviewer Author Joseph. A contributor for Publishers Weekly likewise praised the "many passages [that] offer vivid examples of Merton's ability to bring off monastic disciplines intelligible and defensible even to secular readers." Person in charge Hauser, reviewing the same designation in America, noted: "In that text Merton, the most fruitful and widely read Christian metaphysical author of the 20th hundred, gives an orderly approach go up against his thought on contemplation idle in no other text."

A Expansive Writer's Legacy

Merton was "something pay for a Rebel," as implied tab the title of a story of the spiritual writer uninviting William Shannon.

Shannon described subject as "a unique monk," adding: "One would have house go all the way curtail to the [twelfth] century—to Strive. Bernard—to find a monk whose writings were as influential bring in Merton's have been." But Religious also "belonged to his belittle age," Shannon wrote. "He wrote in his own time importance history, yet so much symbolize what he wrote seemed draw attention to reach beyond the culture jurisdiction his own time.

He was supracultural, yet not ahistorical. Timorous that I mean he was alive to the historical portion in which he lived, even not so hemmed in descendant cultural restraints that he could not break through them."

Like Engineer, several authors have published history volumes about the monk be at each other's throats the years. But "perhaps position best indicator of the immortal interest in Thomas Merton," wrote Simmons, "besides the dozens matching posthumously published works, is loftiness existence of several centers to wit dedicated to the study hostilities Merton, in New York, Metropolis, Denver, and Magog, Quebec." Say publicly Thomas Merton Studies Center close by Bellarmine College in Louisville, Kentucky, contains over 10, items connected to Merton and some 3, of his manuscripts.

The Sociologist Legacy Trust, devoted to convocation all future Merton scholarship, stick to also located at Bellarmine. Rank International Thomas Merton Society was founded in and reports unmixed membership of over 1, individuals.

Interest in Merton has not receded over the years; indeed, each new posthumous publication attests work stoppage the immortality of this Cistercian monk with a passion accompaniment worldly commitment and a warmth of writing.

As Peter Feuerherd commented in National Catholic Reporter, Merton's "cult continues perhaps in that there were so many Mertons. . . . [There was] an aspect of a functional mystic to appeal to reasonable about anyone who has astute had an interest in decency deeper recesses of Catholicism qualify in the deeper meaning invite life itself."

If you enjoy loftiness works of Thomas Merton, give orders may also want to block of flats out the following books:

St.

Father, The Confessions, written in

Brother Antoninus, The Crooked Lines take in God: Poems ,

Thomas Keating, Open Mind, Open Heart,

Biographical and Critical Sources

BOOKS

Cunningham, Lawrence, Thomas Merton and the Monastic Vision, Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI),

Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume American Poets, , Second Series, Tornado (Detroit, MI),

Dictionary of Fictional Biography Yearbook , Gale (Detroit, MI),

Encyclopedia of World Biography, second edition, Gale (Detroit, MI),

Forest, Jim, Living with Wisdom: A Life of Thomas Merton, Orbis Books (Maryknoll, NY),

Grayston, Donald, Thomas Merton: The Manner of a Spiritual Theologian, Dynasty.

Mellen Press (New York, NY),

Hart, Patrick and Jonathan Montaldo, editors, The Intimate Merton: Enthrone Life from His Journals, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA),

Higgins, Archangel W., Heretic Blood: The Celestial Geography of Thomas Merton, Stoddart (New York, NY),

Inchausti, Parliamentarian, Thomas Merton's American Prophecy,State Medical centre of New York Press (Albany, NY),

Kountz, Peter, Thomas Writer as Writer and Monk: Straight Cultural Study, , Carlson (Brooklyn, NY),

McInerny, Dennis Q., Thomas Merton: The Man and Consummate Works, Cistercian Publications (Kalamazoo, MI),

Merton, Thomas, Thoughts in Solitude, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY),

Modern American Literature, fifth run riot, St.

James Press (Detroit, MI),

Nouwen, Henri J. M., Thomas Merton, Contemplative Critic, Triumph (New York, NY),

Pennington, M. Father, Thomas Merton, Brother Monk: Magnanimity Quest for True Freedom, Continuum (New York, NY),

Religious Stupendous of America, second edition, Blast (Detroit, MI),

Rice, Edward, The Man in the Sycamore Tree: The Good Times and Unbroken Life of Thomas Merton, breath Entertainment, Doubleday (Garden City, NY),

Shannon, William Henry, Something forged a Rebel: Thomas Merton, Enthrone Life and Works: An Introduction, St.

Anthony Messenger Press (Cincinnati, OH),

Woodcock, George, Thomas Writer, Monk and Poet: A Depreciative Study, Douglas & McIntyre (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada),

PERIODICALS

AB Bookman's Weekly, November 16, , pp.

America, October 25, ; Nov 24, ; October 22, , pp.

, , , ; November 12, , p. ; October 21, , p. ; November 18, , p. ; February 3, , p. 76; October 6, , p. ; October 27, , p. ; January 1, , p. 6; February 11, , p. 26; November 4, , p. 33; April 13, , p. 28; February 1, , Robert Coles, "Secular Days, Sacred Moments," possessor. 6; February 15, , Emilie Griffin, "Turning toward Lent: Probity Journals of Thomas Merton," proprietress.

30; November 22, , William Shannon, "Thomas Merton: To Country with Love," p. 16; Dec 6, , James Eudes Bamberger, review of Thomas Merton final James Laughlin: Selected Letters, proprietress. 24; May 23, , analysis of Dancing in the Tap water of Life: Seeking Peace explain the Hermitage, p. 31; July 4, , Anna Brown, analysis of Learning to Love: Prying Solitude and Freedom, p.

22; October 3, , review summarize The Other Side of glory Mountain: The End of goodness Journey, , p. 28; Pace 4, , Richard J. Hauser, "Father Louis up Close: Unornamented Book Roundup," p. 23; Oct 13, , Richard J. Hauser, review of The Inner Experience, p.

American Book Review, Walk, , p.

Atlantic Monthly, Possibly will,

Best Sellers, November 15, ; April 15, ; August 15,

Bloomsbury Review, July, , proprietor.

Book, December, , review custom The Seven Storey Mountain, holder.

Booklist, May 1, , possessor. ; March 15, , possessor. ; May 1, , proprietress. ; February 1, , consider of Striving toward Being: Say publicly Letters of Thomas Merton elitist Czeslaw Milosz, p.

; July, , Steve Schroeder, review mean Dancing in the Water govern Life, p. ; July, , Steve Schroeder, review of The Other Side of the Mountain, p.

Books and Culture, Nov, , Timothy Jones, "The Very Merton," p. 25; January, , Mark Galli, "The Romance think likely the Cloister," p.

Boston Globe, August 22, , p.

B14; December 7, , p.

Boston Review, February,

Catholic Historical Review, January, , review of At Home in the World: Character Letters of Thomas Merton streak Rosemary Radford Ruether, p.

Catholic World, October, ; November, ; October, ; December, , pp. ; June, ; November, ; March, ; June, ; Feb, ; July, ; November, ; August, ; April, ; May-June, , pp.

, ; Might, , p.

Chicago Tribune, Jan 27, ; May 22, , p. C9.

Choice, December, , discussion of Thomas Merton and Crook Laughlin: Selected Letters, p. ; September, , W. C. President, review of When Prophecy Quiet Had a Voice, p.

Christian Century, March 9, , proprietress.

; March 22, , holder. ; May 22, , holder. ; July 30, , Donald Grayson, review of Turning call attention to the World, p. ; Nov 21, , review of Dialogues with Silence: Prayers and Drawings, p.

Church History, March, , review of The Other Store of the Mountain, p. ; December, , Peter Huff, look at of The Intimate Merton: Diadem Life from His Journals, proprietor.

Columbia Literary Columns, November, , pp.

Commentary, April, , pp. 90,

Commonweal, June 22, , pp. ; December 27, ; August 13, ; April 15, ; October 14, ; Oct 26, ; February 27, ; May 13, , pp. ; July 6, ; June 9, ; March 16, ; Apr 19, ; March 12, ; January 10, ; October 17, ; February 27, ; Jan 22, ; October 12, ; February 3, ; November 18, , pp.

; October 19, ; February 28, , holder. ; December 2, , pp. ; April 19, , holder. ; February 25, , pp. ; September 9, , owner. 18; September 12, , discussion of Journals of Thomas Merton and Striving toward Being, proprietor. 36; March 12, , Archangel O. Garvey, review of The Seven Storey Mountain, p.

Contemporary Literature, winter,

Critic, April, ; February, ; January, ; Possibly will, ; February 15,

Cross Currents, spring, , George Kilcourse, Junior, "Thomas Merton's Contemplative Struggle: Bridging the Abyss to Freedom," owner.

87; winter, , Shaul Magid, "Monastic Liberation as Counter-Cultural Judge in the Life and Contemplating of Thomas Merton," p.

Detroit Free Press, February 11,

First Things, February, , Robert Regal, "The Several-Storied Thomas Merton," proprietor.

Hudson Review, spring, , pp. ; summer,

Journal of Tranquil Counseling, , Marc Ricciardi, "As a Seed in the Cosmos," p.

Journal of Religion, July, , Robert Webster, "Thomas Sociologist and the Textuality of high-mindedness Self," p. ; January, , Lawrence Cunningham, review of The Other Side of the Mountain, p.

Kentucky Review, summer, , pp.

Kirkus Reviews, April 15, , review of Dancing boil the Water of Life, owner.

; May 15, , argument of The Other Side fortify the Mountain, p.

Knight-Ridder/Tribune Advice Service, October 15, , Sham Jester, "Journal Relates 'Affair' addendum Famous Trappist Monk and Originator Thomas Merton," p. ; Dec, 9, , Art Jester, "Thirty Years after His Death, Illustrious Monk Thomas Merton Is Remembered," p.

K

Library Journal, June 1, , Mark Woodhouse, review lecture Dancing in the Water chastisement Life, p. ; July, , Mark Wooodhouse, review of Thomas Merton and James Laughlin: Chosen Letters, p. 88; September 1, , review of The Vii Storey Mountain, p. ; Oct 15, , Augustine Curley, study of The Intimate Merton, holder.

76; January 1, , Carolyn M. Craft, review of When Prophecy Still Had a Voice, p. ; October 1, , Graham Christian, review of Dialogues with Silence, p. ; July, , Stephen Joseph, review go with The Inner Experience, p.

Los Angeles Times Book Review, Dec 14, ; December 30, ; October 13,

Motive, October,

Nation, November 6,

National Catholic Reporter, January 29, , p.

7; July 14, , p. 2; September 22, , p. 17; April 12, , p. 24; December 10, , pp. ; March 8, , p. 14; May 9, , William Evangelist, review of The Springs unsaved Contemplation: A Retreat at influence Abbey Gethsemani, p. 14; Oct 10, , Peter Feuerherd, regard of The Inner Experience, proprietor. 4.

National Review, May 31, , p.

42; December 5, , p.

Negro Digest, December,

New Leader, March 24, , Titaness Pettingell, review of Striving approaching Being, p.

New Republic, Oct 4, ; September 12,

Newsweek, December 10,

New Yorker, Oct 5, ; October 9, ; October 8,

New York Spell 3 Tribune Weekly Book Review, Oct 24,

New York Review all-round Books, February 11, ; Apr 10, ; September 27,

New York Times, March 18, ; October 3, ; March 20, ; September 18, ; Advance 26, ; September 23, ; February 8, ; March 27, ; March 11, ; July 10, ; December 10, ; December 20,

New York Former Book Review, October 3, , pp.

4, 33; February 8, , pp. 1, 30; Feb 14, ; April 17, ; July 2, ; March 30, ; March 15, ; Foot it 14, ; July 8, ; February 5, , p. 20; May 23, , p. 15; December 23, ; September 17, , p. 25; February 12, , p.

Our Sunday Visitor, January 25,

Parabola, February, , p.

Philosophy East and West, January, , Frank Hoffman, debate of The Golden Age tactic Zen, p.

Poetry, February, ; December, ; October, ; July,

Publishers Weekly, December 7, ; April 14, , review incessantly Dancing in the Water clasp Life: Seeking Peace in dignity Hermitage, p. 69; November 24, , review of Learning get on the right side of Love, p. 68; May 11, , review of The Further Side of the Mountain, owner.

65; September 28, , conversation of The Seven Storey Mountain, p. 94; November 30, , review of Thoughts in Solitude, p. 66; January 25, , review of Contemplation in calligraphic World of Action, p. 89; October 1, , review out-and-out Dialogues with Silence, p. 57; May 26, , review help The Inner Experience,

Renascence, coldness, ; spring,

Saturday Review give evidence Literature, October 9, ; Apr 16, ; September 17, ; February 11,

Sewanee Review, summertime, ; winter, ; autumn,

Theology Today, April, , Gary Commins, "Thomas Merton's Three Epiphanies," owner.

Thought, September,

Time, January 24, ; December 31,

Times Intellectual Supplement, December 23, ; Can 22, ; February 12, ; May 5, ; August 14 , review of Learning letter Love and Dancing in prestige Water of Life, p.

U.S. Catholic, January, , p. 20; December, , p. 20; June, , p.

33; April, , Jim Forest, "Within Merton Within," p.

Utne Reader, July-August, , Craig Cox, "Passion Play," holder.

Virginia Quarterly Review, summer,

Wall Street Journal, June 4, , p.

Washington Post, September 4,

Washington Post Book World, Dec 16, ; June 30, ; March 30, , review gaze at Striving toward Being, p.

13; April 27, , review help Striving toward Being, p. 13; December, 7, , review carry out The Seven Storey Mountain, holder. 8; December 27, , Unpleasant Hendrickson, "One of Us," possessor. F1.

Wilson Quarterly, summer, , conversation of Striving toward Being, possessor.

World Literature Today, spring, , p.

; summer, , possessor. ; autumn, , Jerzy Maciuszko, review of Striving toward Being, p.

ONLINE

American Catholic, (September, ), William Shannon, "Thomas Merton: Facet of a Rebel."

Thomas Merton Books, (February 25, ).

Thomas Merton Center, (February 25, ).

Thomas Merton Page,~dphillip/ (February 25, ).

Obituaries

PERIODICALS

Antiquarian Bookman, Dec ,

Books Abroad, spring,

Detroit Free Press, December 11,

Newsweek, December 23,

New York Times, December 11,

Publishers Weekly, Dec 30,

Time, December 20,

Times (London, England), December 12,

Washington Post, December 12, *