Basil Comes Down From the Attic or Rupert Grant, Private Dick

This was a very sweet little read.  I believe my favorite character—other than of course the prodigy mystic and former Judge, Basil Grant—was Major Brown.  I can only imagine my own horror if I climbed a wall to see pansies arranged in such a malevolent and personal pattern of growth.

Basil Grant's brother, the rather cynical, or at least pessimistic, Rupert Grant—a private detective, whose logic is always shown to be flawed—very much reminded me of many other "# 2s" of the Mystery genre.  Funny that Mr.  Swinburne was Rupert's own "#2" man, as well as the narrator. 

The real target of Chesterton's satire was Mr. Doyle's Holmes.  I do wish to make it known that Chesterton was quite the intellectual fellow.  He often debated his close friend George Bernard Shaw alongside many others.  I give you one of Chesterton's most memorable Holmesian quotes:

[...] to realize that Sherlock Holmes is not really a real logician. He is an ideal logician imagined by an illogical person. [...] But Sherlock Holmes is an ideal figure, and in an imaginative sense a very effective one. He does embody the notion which unreasonable people entertain of what pure reason would be like.

This witty and quite humorous little novel was a pleasure to read.  There is much commentary on the modernity of man, which is not at all outdated, nor will it ever become so.

Paradox runs rampant throughout, as it was one of Chesterton's favorite toys.  There also is a great many memorable quotes within, viz.,

"What is the modern mind?" asked Grant.
"Oh, it's enlightened, you know, and progressive --and faces the facts of life seriously." At this moment another roar of laughter came from within."

The six short stories within are interconnected, sequential, yet independent.  Each presents us with a trade, or way of making a living, that the world has never seen before.  Brilliant!!