The Dorothy Day Library on the Web includes all of Dorothy Day’s writings in The Catholic Worker newspaper as well as selected articles published elsewhere and many of her books.
You can use the search form above, or browse the writings using one of the methods below.
For an additional list of resources about Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker movement, see the bibliography.
Note that these dropdown menus cover all posts on the CatholicWorker.org website. However, posts listed under 1981 or earlier are exclusively from Dorothy’s writings.
An account of the first five years of the Catholic Worker. Describes the C.W. not simply as a newspaper but as a movement. Explicates its position on labor and unions through Peter Maurin’s ideas on personalism. Much of the book, however, is taken up with the day to day experiences of the C.W., describing the soup lines, publication of the paper, picketing, farm communes, and the finances of the C.W. (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1939.
States the objectives of the Catholic Worker and defends it against the accusations of other Catholics and secular thought. Writes on such themes as marriage, sex, the human condition, poverty, economics and a variety of Church doctrines. All of these topics are treated from an orthodox Catholic point of view. The book is adapted from the diary she kept in 1948, when she spent the first four months with Tamar (daughter) and the rest of the year at Mott Street and the retreat farm in Newburgh. She noted that the book could be called a woman’s book, since parts of it are directed solely to women. As usual, much of the book dwells on the day-to-day happenings in her life.
An autobiography written as a letter to her brother John. Conversion story genre of her conversion from Communism to Catholicism. Compiled from articles in America and Preservation of the Faith. Discusses Dostoyevsky’s influence on her life and the lonely experience of her conversion Reads as a baptized version of The Eleventh Virgin, with emphasis on her religious experience throughout her life. Expounds on such topics as Eucharist, prayer, Marxism, capitalism, free will and St. Teresa of Avila.
Autobiographical novel of her pre-conversion years. Begins with family relationships, with emphasis on her mother. Proceeds through her radical years with the pacifist, birth control, socialist and suffrage movements, and ends with her abortion and break up with Lionel Moise (Dick Wemys). William Miller’s biography on D.orothyDay gives the real names of the characters. The New York Times reviewed the book as “just one more adolescent novel,” and D.orothy herself later called it a bad book.
Summary: Describes the hustle and bustle around the farm–planting, building, cooking. Ruminates about conversion, calling each person to a revolution beginning with themselves–to make a start toward a new way of living based on distributism. Says distributism is neither communism nor capitalism but based on individual ownership of land, tools, workshops, and factories. Keyword: economics (DDLW #481).
Summary: Describes her and 18 others’ arrest and court appearances for civil disobedience after demonstrating and not taking shelter in an air raid drill. Speaks of the courage and suffering needed in battle and in using spiritual weapons. Going to jail is one way of visiting the prisoner. (DDLW #243) The Catholic Worker, July-August 1956, pp. 1, 8
Summary: Reflects on the struggle to achieve voluntary poverty in small steps and for a lifetime. Notes that even honorable work involves taxes used for war. Condemns advertising for increasing desires often leading people to poverty. (DDLW #647) The Catholic Worker, April 1953, 1, 5.
Summary: Acknowledges the challenges faced by women following World War Two. Encourages the “personal” application of Christian principles. Gives practical approaches to this task and advocates “the little way.” (DDLW #153) The Catholic Worker, Nov 1945, p. 1
Summary: A month of travelling and giving talks in Massachusetts, New York, and Indiana. Visits Tamar and the grand children in Vermont. Discusses farming communes and complains about the encroaching State. Admires the Shakers and Hutterites and advocates a personalist and communitarian society. (The Catholic Worker, December 1958, 1, 7. DDLW #748).
Summary: Eulogizes Gandhi as a pacifist martyr and a clear example of “divinized humanity.” Sees his death as added to the sacrifice of Christ, sharing in the folly of the cross. Calls his way of non-violence “the full way, because he adhered to an Absolute.” (The Catholic Worker, February 1948, 1. DDLW #463).
Summary: Observations about the hardships of Mother Seton, the gift of thirty dozen eggs, the oppression of a steelworker, and an accident befalling three poor boys. Recommends nursery schools so mothers can work and not be separated from their children by the city. A book review of Calverton’s The Passing of the Godswhich is dismissed as “the shallowest book of the month.” (The Catholic Worker, November 1934, 6. DDLW #283).
