Despite insisting that he was a journalist, G. K. Chesterton was famous in his day as the author of over one hundred books, including the Father Brown stories, still in print today and the foundation of the BBC adaptations which have become a permanent feature of this country's daytime TV. He was a character, literally larger than life, a man renowned for his wit who in his final years became even better known as a broadcaster on BBC radio. The Sins of G. K. Chesterton explores an often-overlooked aspect of Chesterton's life and work - the influences of and personal relationships with his younger brother Cecil, Cecil's wife Ada (also known as 'Keith') and, in particular, the friend and mentor of both brothers, Hilaire Belloc.
This brilliant biographical study challenges the conventional image of Chesterton as a saintly innocent leading a severe and uneventful life. With the help of previously unpublished material, Richard Ingrams reveals a more vulnerable figure, manipulated by his brother and Belloc, the domineering Anglo-Frenchman. It was the influence of both men that involved Chesterton in the greatest controversy of his life - the Marconi scandal.
While Ingrams's vivid account of the scandal and its aftermath is a stark reminder that anti-Semitism is nothing new in British political life, this work it is also an absorbing tribute to a great English writer in need of rediscovery.