Manalive by G.K. Chesterton

I've never read anything by G.K. Chesterton. I know Orthodoxy is a favorite of Regan's, but for some reason I decided to start with his fiction. What a strange, unexpected, little book is Manalive by G.K. Chesterton.

The setting is a boarding house in London (I believe), with its requisite odd group of characters. As they are standing out in the garden one day, discussing the day's news and philosophizing, a strange man bursts over the fence and changes their lives. His strange, child-like behavior proves very off-putting at first, but within a short time, he grows on them. When he, however, desires to propose to one of the group's friends, they are thrown into a conundrum. How can their sweet, innocent friend possibly marry a man as silly and guileless as Mr. Innocent Smith. 

To simply consider the possibility of living a simple, care-free life, throwing caution to the wind and taking a chance suddenly begins to open up new ways of living that they had never imagined. Just as they are considering the implications, a doctor and an officer show up looking for Mr. Smith who appears to be quite the conman and criminal. 

The group commences an in-house trial and the prosecution gets to work. Yet every single example, be it of burglary or even adultery, can be explained by the defense. 

It turns out that Mr. Innocent Smith has decided that he will LIVE as long as he is alive. To the unsuspecting world who spends most of their time just waiting to die, this can look quite unorthodox. (Ironic for the man best known for Orthodoxy.) 

At the end of this delightful book, Chesterton says, “There is but one answer, and I am sorry if you don't like it. If Innocent is happy, it is because he is innocent. If he can defy the conventions, it is just because he can keep the commandments. It is just because he does not want to kill but to excite to life that a pistol is still as exciting to him as it is to a schoolboy. It is just because he does not want to steal, because he does not covet his neighbour's goods, that he has captured the trick (oh, how we all long for it!), the trick of coveting his own goods. It is just because he does not want to commit adultery that he achieves the romance of sex; it is just because he loves one wife that he has a hundred honeymoons. If he had really murdered a man, if he had really deserted a woman, he would not be able to feel that a pistol or a love letter was like a song—at least, not a comic song.” (p. 183)

It's a sweet book with a sweet (however probably highly impracticable) lesson.