Wednesday, November 6, 2013

Are you a Bellocian?

Are you a Bellocian? Do you think you might be a Bellocian? Do you suspect someone you know and love might be a Bellocian?

If the answer to any of these questions is "yes", don't panic. Just take yourself to the Central Catholic Library in 74, Merrion Square, Dublin at 1:30 this Saturday. (The same place where my Chesterton Society has had most of its meetings.)

On that day, it is hoped that an Irish Hilaire Belloc Society will be formed. This is what I've been told: "It is hoped that a president and officers can be elected, and a winter reading programme, based on the writings of Belloc, can be developed."

I am only a Bellocian in a very small way, certainly as compared with my chronic Chestertonianism. But there is a Belloc quotation at the bottom of this blog, so I suppose I am a bit of one, after all. And I will be hauling myself down there, although rather late because I am working on Saturday morning. (I was at the previous get-together, which I suppose was a kind of pre-foundational meeting. It was a lot of fun.)

Go on. Think about it!

6 comments:

  1. I don't really know anything about Chesterton and Belloc. I've heard of them of course, know they're Catholic, that they worked on a system called Distributism, and that they did a good bit of writing. I've never read any of their writings though, and I can't say I know nearly enough to have a simple conversation about. Still, I'd be interested in going for the sake of hearing other people speak. Is it a free for all, or is it a bit exclusive?

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  2. You should definitely go! Don't worry about not having read Belloc. If you have time and feel like it, you might read a few of his essays or other stuff, or even just some stuff about him on the internet. But, whether you do or not, you'd definitely be welcome. I think you'd find it interesting! I don't think it will be at all exclusive-- I know the guy organizing it is eager to get people to come.

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  3. Maolsheachlann,
    Do you run the Irish Chesterton Society? I mean alone? I saw your post over there, so I was surprised to see you are running 2 blogs.

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  4. I don't run the Chesterton Society on my own, my friend Angelo Bottone runs it with me. I do write the blog-- though I've barely updated it in the last few months. The last meeting was in June.

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  5. Oh yes, I forgot to ask if it's formal clothes or not.

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  6. Not at all! My Chesterton society meetings never drew more than eight people, except once when we had a guest speaker (Mark Dooley, the columnist and philosopher). The Belloc Society might do better but I can't imagine it would be all that many more.

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