A Message from the President

Welcome to the website of the Russell Kirk Center.

Russell and Annette Kirk

We hope that visitors to this site will be inspired to discover more about the life and thought of Russell Kirk and about the work of the Center that carries forward his legacy today. Russell believed deeply that civilization can only thrive when there is, in the words of Edmund Burke, a partnership of “those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are yet to be born.”

Russell saw his mission as conveying to America’s rising generations an understanding of the process by which a healthy culture is transmitted from age to age. Today, this mission is continued in the work of the Russell Kirk Center, which promotes, through its publications, seminars, and fellowships, an appreciation of the “permanent things” that maintain and nurture our civil social order.

You will find on this website information about Russell’s life and writings and about the various projects that we administer here at the Center. There are links that will enable you to find and purchase books by Russell Kirk, subscribe to the Center’s publications, and learn more about our academic programs.

If you would like to support us in our work of intellectual and cultural renewal, please contact us for information on how to make a donation to the Center.

Sincerely,

Annette Y. Kirk

Russell Kirk’s 1953 book The Conservative Mind gave American conservatives an identity and a genealogy and catalyzed the postwar conservative movement.

The New York Times, 1998

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News and Events

Eliot Conference

The Kirk Center is co-sponsoring a conference on T. S. Eliot on August 14–16, 2008 in conjunction with the new edition of Dr. Kirk’s book, Eliot and His Age. See the conference page for details.

May 2008

Healy Interview

The Bookman has just posted an interview with Gene Healy, author of the new book, The Cult of the Presidency: America’s Dangerous Devotion to Executive Power.

May 2008

New Bookman

University BookmanThe new Spring issue of the University Bookman is out and the full contents are posted on our site. The issue is devoted to the art of biography with reviews of new books on Ralph Adams Cram (by Dan McCarthy), Orestes Brownson, conservative luminary Gerhart Niemeyer, and others. Subscribe here.

Apr 2008

Kirk Audio: Two Revolutions

We have posted a 50-minute audio lecture from 1990 with Dr. Kirk speaking on Edmund Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France and related themes.

Apr 2008

Open Court Backlist Find

Open Court Publishing has found a stock of three Kirk-related books that had been thought out of print. You can order books directly from them by calling 800-815-2280 (or +1-603-924-7209); they do not appear on their website. The books available are Kirk’s essay collections Enemies of the Permanent Things and Beyond the Dreams of Avarice and the essay collection in his honor, The Unbought Grace of Life, edited by James E. Person, Jr.

Apr 2008

Kirk and Buckley on Video

The Kirk Center is pleased to announce that will periodically be posting video clips from our archive on the web site. The first two videos are now available—a 1993 interview with Russell Kirk on the fortieth anniversary of The Conservative Mind, and a 1996 interview with the late William F. Buckley, Jr. on his relationship with Dr. Kirk. Watch for further updates!

Mar 2008