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In the genre of the finely crafted English detective story, Chestertons Father Brown stories are wholesome and stimulating detective tales surpassed by few others, except perhaps Doyles legendary Sherlock Holmes. In contrast to the arrogant Holmes, however, Chestertons protagonist is rather quiet, unassuming and modest, and makes an unlikely hero – a catholic priest. Father Browns simple manner makes you quick to underestimate him, but the startling flashes of brilliance that spill from beneath his humble exterior soon make you realize that he has a firm grasp on the truth of a situation when you are as yet frustratingly distant from it. His perceptive one-liners make it evident that he has a clear insight into something that you see only as an apparently insoluble paradox. <p> Chesterton has been called the prince of paradox, and the Father Brown stories are a clear testimony of his fondness for paradox. Ultimately it is not just crimes that Brown must solve, but the paradox underlying them. In fact, not all stories are crime stories – among them are mysterious situations that do not involve criminals, and it is the perceptive insight of Father Brown that is needed make apparent contradictions comprehensible by his ruthless logic. Father Brown is not so much concerned with preserving life or bringing a criminal to justice as he is with unravelling the strands of an impossible paradox. In fact, Chestertons conception of Father Brown is itself a paradox – both a cleric and a crime-fighter, a priest and a policeman, a representative of Gods mercy and an instrument of Gods justice, a proclaimer of forgiveness and a seeker of guilt, a listener in the confessional and a questioner in the interrogation. <p> How a priest could possibly play the role of a detective is explained in the first story, The Blue Cross. Brown apprehends the confounded criminal Flambeau and explains that his knowledge of the criminal mind is due in part to what hes heard at the confessional booth We cant help being priests. People come and tell us these things. When Flambeau retorts How in blazes do you know all these horrors? Chesterton allows his humble priest to attribute his insight into human depravity to his experience as a priest: Oh, by being a celibate simpleton, I suppose, he said. Has it never struck you that a man who does next to nothing but hear mens real sins is not likely to be wholly unaware of human evil. <p> Father Browns tongue never fails to produce profound paradoxical gems such as The point of the pin was that it was pointless. And: I never should have thought he would be so illogical as to die in order to avoid death. It is Browns unique perspective that allows him to see what others do not see. When his compatriots are awed at the eloquence of a magistrates thundering sermon in the Mirror of the Magistrate, Father Brown remarks: I think the thing that struck me most was how different men look in their wigs. You talk about the prosecuting barrister being so tremendous. But I happened to see him take his wig off for a minute, and he really looks quite a different man. Hes quite bald, for one thing. <p> With the finely crafted prose, depth of theological insight, and brilliant combination of perception and paradox, Chesterton has created in Father Brown a noble and enduring character, a worthy successor to Sherlock Holmes and in some respects his equal and superior. The Father Brown stories are unquestionably worthy of their designation as classics.