DEDICATION: for Bruce Kidd, champion runner, champion of good causes AUTHOR’S PREFACE It is my belief that athletes, at their best, are moved by the same sense of vocation as are artists and people called to the religious life. If they are professional athletes, they are often well paid. But…

DEDICATION: for John Howard Griffin man of profound faith contemplative, activist AUTHOR’S PREFACE Most books, in the Alphabeticon series, focus on paying tribute to men and women, past and present, who have been important in some particular field of human endeavour. That is true of this volume, but only partly…

DEDICATION: for Sister Veronica O’Reilly, CSJ historian of the Community of St Joseph AUTHOR’S PREFACE Christina Rossetti (1830–94) was the pre-eminent poet of the Anglo-Catholic revival, which transformed Anglican life in Victorian England. Little read nowadays except by specialists, she is still widely known as author of the Christmas hymn…

DEDICATION: for Robert Weaver lover of good writing patron of good writers AUTHOR’S PREFACE This portrait gallery of twenty-six writers is the almost inevitable by-product of a lifelong love of books. One of my earliest memories is of sitting in our family living-room in the late afternoon, aged four, listening…

DEDICATION: for Harry Freedman composer of masterpieces master of the art of friendship AUTHOR’S PREFACE The twenty-six composers portrayed in this book were variously active in serious music, as distinct from folk music or pop music, during most periods of western culture from the fifteenth to the twentieth century, but…

DEDICATION: To the good memory of Josef Červinka who kept alive the tradition of enlightened radio when all around was brutality and lies AUTHOR’S PREFACE This book pays tribute to the art of radio, which played a major role in my life from an early age. After my family left…