Esolen or else

The Internet belches forth no end of dreck, but I think most of us have a person or two whose contemporary writing incites a private happy dance. Aside from people I actually know, whose thoughts therefore interest me and whose family photos bring me joy, a guy who gets me happy dancing in my own dour and humorless way is Anthony Esolen. He's at Touchstone and the Mere Comments blog, he was a guest on Issues, Etc. recently, and he turns up other places too. Perhaps the most astonishing thing about him is that he's an English professor who doesn't run away crying if you say some numbers in front of him. Get your ears on some Esolen, the man is good. Here's an article my brother-in-law sent me on being a Woman of Leisure:

But what is this life for, after all? . . . . It is not the vale of body building, or of career crafting, or of job enhancement, but of soul making, and if we take the lessons of our faith seriously, that can only be by humility, opening ourselves up to the beauty and wonder of the world, and deigning to love those most beautiful and wondrous creatures, our fellow human beings. Certainly we can do that in our work -- I am not saying that any arena of human endeavor is shut off from grace. But let us beware. The tendrils of work for work's sake and of self for self's sake have long been maddeningly entwined.

Sweet, Esolen posted again.