Thomas Merton, the Trappist monk who died in 1968, was one of the greatest spiritual writers of the twentieth century. His published works include a hundred volumes in many genres. But it was perhaps in the essay form that Merton found his natural element. This volume is the first to provide a broad cross-section of Merton s work as an essayist, collecting characteristic examples of his astonishing output and the range of his interests from Faulkner and Zen to nuclear war and the contemplative life."
