Eugenics and Other Evils (Annotated)

by G. K. Chesterton

Overview

• This edition includes the following editor's introduction: G. K. Chesterton, the man beyond the writer

The early twentieth-century was a time when many works, including popular essays, were written on eugenics and eugenic theory, usually to promote the ideas. However, significant anti-eugenic essays also circulated, the most famous of which is “Eugenics and Other Evils” (AKA Eugenics and Other Evils: an argument against scientifically organized state), written by English author and philosopher G. K. Chesterton and originally published in 1922, just a few years after the close of the 'Great War.'
In “Eugenics and Other Evils,” Chesterton argues that eugenic laws are a means of suppressing the poor, and predicts the abuse of eugenics. The book was influential enough that the British Parliament began to question eugenic legislation, and indeed eugenic legislation as existed in the United States was never passed in Great Britain.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9791222002545
Publisher:	ePembaBooks
Publication date:	11/18/2022
Sold by:	StreetLib SRL
Format:	eBook
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Gilbert Keith Chesterton (29 May 1874 - 14 June 1936) better known as G. K. Chesterton, was an English writer, lay theologian, poet, philosopher, dramatist, journalist, orator, literary and art critic, biographer, and Christian apologist. Chesterton is often referred to as the "prince of paradox." Time magazine, in a review of a biography of Chesterton, observed of his writing style: "Whenever possible Chesterton made his points with popular sayings, proverbs, allegories-first carefully turning them inside out."
Chesterton is well known for his fictional priest-detective Father Brown, and for his reasoned apologetics. Even some of those who disagree with him have recognized the wide appeal of such works as Orthodoxy and The Everlasting Man. Chesterton, as a political thinker, cast aspersions on both Progressivism and Conservatism, saying, "The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected." Chesterton routinely referred to himself as an "orthodox" Christian, and came to identify this position more and more with Catholicism, eventually converting to Roman Catholicism from High Church Anglicanism. George Bernard Shaw, Chesterton's "friendly enemy" according to Time, said of him, "He was a man of colossal genius." Biographers have identified him as a successor to such Victorian authors as Matthew Arnold, Thomas Carlyle, Cardinal John Henry Newman, and John Ruskin.