An English prose writer, poet, essayist, social thinker and Christian apologist, a renowned master of paradoxes and author of detective novels that have become classics of the genre, Gilbert Keith Chesterton was born in London in the family of the owner of a real estate agency Edward Chesterton. After graduating from St. Paul's London School in 1892, he studied art for some time at Slade's renowned art school, and also attended literary courses at University College London. For five years, Chesterton worked as an editor at T. Fischer Anvin’s publishing house, and since 1899, collaborated in the liberal weekly Speaker as an art and literary critic; in 1900 he published two poetry collections with his own illustrations; from 1901 until 1913 he led a weekly literary column in the Daily News newspaper, and from 1905 he became a permanent columnist for the newspaper Illyustreid London News.
