Lewis, C(live) S(taples) 1898-1963 (N. W. Clerk, Clive Hamilton)

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LEWIS, C(live) S(taples) 1898-1963
(N. W. Clerk, Clive Hamilton)

PERSONAL:

Born November 29, 1898, in Belfast, Ireland (now Northern Ireland); died of heart failure after an extended illness, November 22, 1963, in Oxford, England; son of Albert James (a solicitor) and Flora Augusta (Hamilton) Lewis; married Joy Davidman Gresham (a poet and novelist), 1956 (died, 1960); stepchildren: David Gresham, Douglas Gresham. Education: Attended Malvern College, 1913-14; University College, Oxford, A.B. (first-class honors), 1922, A.B. (first-class honors), 1923. Hobbies and other interests: Walking.

CAREER:

University College, Oxford, Oxford, England, philosophy tutor and lecturer, 1924; Magdalen College, Oxford, fellow and tutor in English literature, 1925-54; Magdalene College, Cambridge, Cambridge, England, professor of Medieval and Renaissance English, 1954-63. Ballard Matthews Lecturer, University of Wales, 1941; Riddell Lecturer, University of Durham, 1942; Clark Lecturer, Trinity College, Cambridge, 1944. Speaker at universities, churches, public forums, and on BBC Radio. Military service: British Royal Army, Somerset Light Infantry, 1918-19; became second lieutenant.

MEMBER:

British Academy, Royal Society of Literature, Sir Walter Scott Society (president, 1956), Oxford Socratic Club (founding member and speaker; president, 1941-54), Inklings (literary group), Athenaeum Club.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Hawthornden Prize, 1936, and Gollancz Memorial Prize for Literature, 1937, both for The Allegory of Love; Carnegie Medal Commendation, British Library Association, 1955, for The Horse and His Boy; Library Association Carnegie Medal, 1957, for The Last Battle; Lewis Carroll Shelf Award, 1962, for The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. D.D., University of St. Andrews, 1946; Docteur-es-Lettres, Laval University, 1952; D.Litt., University of Manchester, 1959; honorary doctorate, University of Dijon, 1962, University of Lyon, 1963.

WRITINGS:

FICTION

The Pilgrim's Regress: An Allegorical Apology for Christianity, Reason, and Romanticism, Dent (London, England), 1933, Sheed & Ward (New York, NY), 1935, revised edition, Fount (London, England), 1977.

Out of the Silent Planet (also see below), John Lane (London, England), 1938, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1943, abridged edition, Macmillan, 1973, reprinted, Scribner (New York, NY), 1996.

The Screwtape Letters (first published in the Guardian, 1941), G. Bles (London, England), 1942, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1943, revised edition published as The Screwtape Letters and Screwtape Proposes a Toast (also see below), G. Bles, 1961, Macmillan, 1962, reprinted, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 2001.

Perelandra (also see below), John Lane (London, England), 1943, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1944, new edition published as Voyage to Venus, Pan Books (London, England), 1960, reprinted under original title, Scribner (New York, NY), 1996.

That Hideous Strength: A Modern Fairy-Tale for Grownups (also see below), John Lane (London, England), 1945, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1946, abridged edition published as The Tortured Planet, Avon (New York, NY), 1958, reprinted, Scribner (New York, NY), 1996.

The Great Divorce: A Dream (first serialized in the Guardian), G. Bles (London, England), 1945, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1996.

Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold, G. Bles (London, England), 1956, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1957, reprinted, G. K. Hall (Thorndike, ME), 1998.

Screwtape Proposes a Toast and Other Pieces, Collins, 1965, published as Screwtape Proposes a Toast, Fontana (London, England), 1970.

Space Trilogy (boxed set; includes Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength), Macmillan (New York, NY), 1975.

The Dark Tower and Other Stories (includes two unfinished novels), edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich (New York, NY), 1977.

FICTION FOR CHILDREN; "CHRONICLES OF NARNIA"

The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe: A Story for Children (also see below), illustrated by Pauline Baynes, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1950, reprinted HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2003.

Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia (also see below), illustrated by Pauline Baynes, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1951, reprinted, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2003.

The Voyage of the "Dawn Treader" (also see below), illustrated by Pauline Baynes, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1952.

The Silver Chair (also see below), illustrated by Pauline Baynes, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1953.

The Horse and His Boy (also see below), illustrated by Pauline Baynes, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1954.

The Magician's Nephew (also see below), illustrated by Pauline Baynes, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1955, reprinted, 2003, abridged and illustrated by Robin Lawrie, HarperCollins (New York, NY) 1999.

The Last Battle (also see below), illustrated by Pauline Baynes, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1956, reprinted, Thorndike Press (Thorndike, ME), 2001.

The Complete Chronicles of Narnia, seven volumes, Penguin (New York, NY), 1965, published as The Chronicles of Narnia, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1983, reprinted, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 1994.

The Wisdom of Narnia, illustrated by Pauline Baynes, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2001.

POETRY

(Under pseudonym Clive Hamilton) Spirits in Bondage: A Cycle of Lyrics, Heinemann (London, England), 1919, published under name C. S. Lewis, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1984.

(Under pseudonym Clive Hamilton) Dymer, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1926.

Poems, edited by Walter Hooper, G. Bles (London, England), 1964, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1965.

Narrative Poems, edited by Walter Hooper, G. Bles (London, England), 1969, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1972.

LITERARY CRITICISM

The Allegory of Love: A Study in Medieval Tradition, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1936.

(With Eustace M. W. Tillyard) The Personal Heresy: A Controversy, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1939.

Rehabilitations and Other Essays, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1939, reprinted, Folcroft (Folcroft, PA), 1980.

A Preface to "Paradise Lost": Being the Ballard Matthews Lectures, Delivered at University College, North Wales, 1941, Oxford University Press (London, England), 1942, revised edition, 1961.

Hamlet: The Prince or the Poem? (lecture), H. Milford (London, England), 1942, reprinted, Norwood Editions (Norwood, PA), 1978.

(Editor and author of commentary) Charles Williams, Arthurian Torso: Containing the Posthumous Fragment of "The Figure of Arthur" (also see below), Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1948, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1974.

The Literary Impact of the Authorized Version: The Ethel M. Wood Lecture, Athlone Press (London, England), 1950, Fortress Press (Philadelphia, PA), 1963, revised edition, 1967.

Hero and Leander (lecture), Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1952.

English Literature in the Sixteenth Century, Excluding Drama, Clarendon Press (Oxford, England), 1954, published as Poetry and Prose in the Sixteenth Century, 1990.

De Descriptione Temporum: An Inaugural Lecture (also see below), Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, England), 1955.

Studies in Words, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, England), 1960, 2nd edition, 1967.

An Experiment in Criticism, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, England), 1961.

They Asked for a Paper: Papers and Addresses (also see below), G. Bles (London, England), 1962.

(Author of introduction) Selections from Layamon's "Brut," edited by G. L. Brook, Clarendon Press (Oxford, England), 1963.

The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, England), 1964, reprinted, 1994.

Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Literature, edited by Walter Hooper, Cambridge University Press (New York, NY), 1967, reprinted, 1998.

Spenser's Images of Life, edited by Alastair Fowler, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, England), 1967.

Selected Literary Essays, edited by Walter Hooper, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, England), 1969.

Shelley, Dryden, and Mr. Eliot in Rehabilitations, Richard West (Philadelphia, PA), 1973.

On Stories and Other Essays on Literature, edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1982.

NONFICTION

The Problem of Pain, Centenary Press, 1940, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1943, reprinted, Harper-SanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 2001.

The Weight of Glory (also see below), Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (London, England), 1942, revised and expanded edition, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1980.

Broadcast Talks: Right and Wrong; A Clue to the Meaning of the Universe and What Christians Believe, G. Bles (London, England), 1942, published as The Case for Christianity (also see below), Macmillan (New York, NY), 1943.

Christian Behaviour: A Further Series of Broadcast Talks (also see below), Macmillan (New York, NY), 1943.

The Abolition of Man; or, Reflections on Education with Special Reference to the Teaching of English in the Upper Forms of Schools, Oxford University Press (London, England), 1943, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1947, reprinted, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA) 2001.

Beyond Personality: The Christian Idea of God (also see below), G. Bles (London, England), 1944, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1945.

Miracles: A Preliminary Study, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1947, reprinted, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 2001.

Vivisection, New England Anti-Vivisection Society, c. 1947.

The Trouble with X, Church Union, Church Literature Association (London, England), 1948.

The Weight of Glory, and Other Addresses, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1949, reprinted, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1996.

Mere Christianity (contains revised and enlarged versions of The Case for Christianity, Christian Behaviour, and Beyond Personality), Macmillan (New York, NY), 1952, revised edition with new introduction, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 2001.

Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life (autobiography), G. Bles (London, England), 1955, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1956.

Reflections on the Psalms, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1958, reprinted, Phoenix Press (Newbury, Berkshire, England), 1985.

Shall We Lose God in Outer Space? (also see below), Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (London, England), 1959.

The World's Last Night, and Other Essays (includes Shall We Lose God in Outer Space?), Harcourt (New York, NY), 1960.

The Four Loves, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1960, reprinted, Collins (London, England), 1987.

(Under pseudonym N. W. Clerk) A Grief Observed (autobiography), Faber & Faber (London, England), 1961, Seabury Press (Greenwich, CT), 1963, published under name C. S. Lewis, Walker (New York, NY), 1988.

Essays Presented to Charles Williams, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1966.

Of Other Worlds: Essays and Stories, edited by Walter Hooper, G. Bles (London, England), 1966, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1967.

A Mind Awake: An Anthology of C. S. Lewis, edited by Clyde S. Kilby, G. Bles (London, England), 1968, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1969.

God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics, edited by Walter Hooper, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1970, published as Undeceptions: Essays on Theology and Ethics, G. Bles (London, England), 1971, new edition published as First and Second Things, Fount (London, England), 1985.

The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment, Abingdon (Nashville, TN), 1972.

Fern-Seed and Elephants and Other Essays on Christianity, edited by Walter Hooper, Fontana (London, England), 1975.

The Joyful Christian: 127 Readings, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1977.

C. S. Lewis at the Breakfast Table, and Other Reminiscences, edited by James T. Como, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1979.

The Visionary Christian: 131 Readings, selected by Chad Walsh, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1981.

The Grand Miracle, Ballantine (New York, NY), 1983.

(With Owen Barfield) A Cretaceous Perambulator (the Re-examination Of) (parody), edited by Walter Hooper, Oxford University C. S. Lewis Society (Oxford, England), 1983.

The Business of Heaven: Daily Readings with C. S. Lewis, edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1984, reprinted as Readings for Meditation and Reflection, HarperSanFrancisco (San Fransisco, CA), 1996.

Of This and Other Worlds, edited by Walter Hooper, Fount (London, England), 1984.

Boxen: The Imaginary World of the Young C. S. Lewis (juvenilia), edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1985.

Present Concerns (essays), edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1986.

The Seeing Eye, and Other Selected Essays from Christian Reflections, Ballantine (New York, NY), 1986.

The Essential C. S. Lewis, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1988.

Timeless at Heart, edited by Walter Hooper, Fount (London, England), 1988.

All My Road before Me: The Diary of C. S. Lewis, 1922-1927, edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1991.

The Collected Works of C. S. Lewis, Inspirational Press (New York, NY), 1996.

C. S. Lewis on Love, compiled by Lesley Walmsley, Thomas Nelson (Nashville, TN), 1998.

C. S. Lewis on Joy, compiled by Lesley Walmsley, Thomas Nelson (Nashville, TN), 1998.

C. S. Lewis on Grief, compiled by Lesley Walmsley, Thomas Nelson (Nashville, TN), 1998.

C. S. Lewis on Faith, compiled by Lesley Walmsley, Thomas Nelson (Nashville, TN), 1998.

The Beloved Works of C. S. Lewis, Family Christian Press (Grand Rapids, MI), 1998.

The Spirit of C. S. Lewis: A Year of Readings from His Life and Work, edited by Lesley Walmsley, Fount (London, England), 1999.

To Quote C. S. Lewis, compiled by Owen Collins, Fount (London, England), 2000.

Favorite Quotations from C. S. Lewis for Latter-Day Saints, compiled by J. A. Parry, Eagle Gate (Salt Lake City, UT), 2000.

Essay Collections, Literature, Philosophy, and Short Stories, HarperCollins (London, England), 2002.

The Complete C. S. Lewis Signature Classics, (includes Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, The Problem of Pain, Miracles, A Grief Observed, and The Abolition of Man), HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 2002.

A Year with C. S. Lewis: Daily Readings from His Classic Works, edited by Patricia S. Klein, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 2003.

LETTERS

Beyond the Bright Blur, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1963.

Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1964.

Letters of C. S. Lewis, edited by brother, W. H. Lewis, Harcourt, 1966, with memoirs by W. H. Lewis, 1975, revised and enlarged, edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1993.

Letters to an American Lady, edited by Clyde S. Kilby, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1967.

Mark vs. Tristram: Correspondence between C. S. Lewis and Owen Barfield, edited by Walter Hooper, Lowell House Printers (Cambridge, MA), 1967.

They Stand Together: The Letters of C. S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves (1914-1963), edited by Walter Hooper, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1979.

Letters to Children, edited by Lyle W. Dorsett and Marjorie Lamp Mead, foreword by Douglas H. Gresham, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1985.

Letters: C. S. Lewis and Don Giovanni Calabria, Servant (Ann Arbor, MI), 1988.

C. S. Lewis Letters: A Study in Friendship, translation from the Latin by Martin Moynihan, Servant (Ann Arbor, MI), 1988.

The Latin Letters of C. S. Lewis, translated and edited by Martin Moynihan, St. Augustine's Press (South Bend, IN), 1998.

Collected Letters, edited by Walter Hooper, HarperCollins (London, England), 2000.

Also contributor to books, including Essays on Malory, edited by J. A. W. Bennett, Clarendon Press (Oxford, England), 1963; Christian Reflections, edited by Walter Hooper, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1967; (author of commentary) Charles W. S. Williams, Taliessin through Logres, The Region of the Summer Stars, [and] Arthurian Torso, W. B. Eerdmans, 1974; Sheldon Vanauken, A Severe Mercy: C. S. Lewis and a Pagan Love Invaded by Christ, Told by One of the Lovers, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 1977; Eglerio!: In Praise of Tolkien, edited by Anne Etkin, Questi Communications, 1978; Christian Childhoods: An Anthology of Personal Memories, edited by Celia Van Oss, Crossroad, 1986; and The Collier Christian Library, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1988. Contributor to conference proceedings.

Lewis's papers are held at the Bodleian Library at Oxford University, Oxford, England, and in the Marion Wade Collection at Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL.

ADAPTATIONS:

Theater: (Adapted by Jules Tasca, Thomas Tierney and Ted Drachman) Narnia the Musical, first produced in New York City at St. Stephens Church, September 29, 1986. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, first produced in Chicago, IL, at the Lifeline Theater, December, 1986. Television: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (animated), Lord & King Associates, CBS-TV, April 1-2, 1979. The Chronicles of Narnia (miniseries), PBS-TV, 1989. Recordings: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Caedmon, 1978; The Chronicles of Narnia; Prince Caspian, Caedmon, 1979. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the "Dawn Treader," Caedmon, 1979. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair, Caedmon, 1980. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Horse and His Boy, Caedmon, 1980. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician's Nephew, Caedmon, 1980. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle, Caedmon, 1981. Cassette recordings have been produced of Lewis's work, including Out of the Silent Planet, Books on Tape, Perelandra, Books on Tape, Philia, Word Books, Storge, Word Books, That Hideous Strength, Books on Tape, and The Four Loves, Catacomb. Other recordings have been made of The Four Loves, Word Books, and Agape (title means "Divine Love"), Word Books. Children's books: Pauline Baynes has adapted several books from "The Chronicles of Narnia" series into new books for children, with her own illustrations. Film: A film adaptation of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, directed by Andrew Adamson, is scheduled for release in 2005.

SIDELIGHTS:

Whether one approaches C. S. Lewis through the fantasy land of Narnia, the mythic worlds of Malacandra and Perelandra, the playful, satiric letters of senior devil Screwtape to his nephew, under-devil Wormwood, Lewis's witty but thoroughly logical theological works, or the critical literary studies that established him as a noted scholar, all paths lead to an encounter with the Christian faith that thoroughly shaped Lewis's life and writing. Phrases such as "apostle to the skeptics" and "defender of the faith" testify to the influence of Lewis's thought upon readers beginning in the mid-twentieth century and continuing through to the next century. A Times Literary Supplement reviewer commented that "for the last thirty years of his life no other Christian writer in [England] … had such influence on the general reading public as C. S. Lewis. Each new book from his pen was awaited with an eagerness which showed that thousands of intelligent men and women had acquired a taste for his distinctive idiom and had come to rely on him as a source of moral and intellectual insight."

Critics have pointed out that Lewis's own journey from atheism to a vital Christian faith uniquely qualified him to defend that faith against its severest opponents. Though brought up in a nominally Christian home, while at boarding school Lewis rejected any belief in God. In his autobiography Surprised by Joy, the writer described his intellectual and spiritual development from childhood through adolescence and early adulthood. Richard B. Cunningham summarized Lewis's journey in C. S. Lewis: Defender of the Faith: "Reason and imagination, beginning early in his life and often pulling in opposite directions, were the controlling elements in [Lewis's] intellectual and spiritual pilgrimage.… His imagination and reason converged at the point of revelation; and for him revelation pointed to where myth had become fact: the Incarnate God Jesus Christ." Describing the moment of his conversion to theism, which came as a necessary submission to indisputable evidence, Lewis wrote in Surprised by Joy: "You must picture me alone in [my] room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet.… In the Trinity term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England." He further described himself as "a prodigal who is brought in kicking, struggling, resentful, and darting his eyes in every direction for a chance of escape."

Lewis may have been reluctant at first but he soon became one of the leading influences on the popular religious thought of his day. In speaking engagements at universities, churches, and public forums, as well as through a series of BBC radio programs broadcast in the early 1940s, "Lewis styled himself as a common man addressing concerns faced by all," Jonathan D. Evans pointed out in the Dictionary of Literary Biography, "including both the naive but honest skeptic and the unsophisticated Christian in an intellectually complex world." When writing about these same issues in collections such as Broadcast Talks, Christian Behavior, and Mere Christianity, Lewis maintains his common-man approach and preserves the conversational nature of his speeches. "His essays often read like the written version of a one-sided conversation between Lewis and his audience," Evans observed. At this stage of his life and career as a writer, to explain his conversion to Christianity and to make his case on behalf of Christian faith, Lewis employed a sophisticated blend of logic and understanding of his audience. Noted Evans, "Lewis is often credited with the use of unassailable logic, and careful dialectic was one of his important modes of operation.… However … more often than not Lewis wins his arguments through subtle identification with readers' preconceptions and common predilections rather than through pristine logic."

While developing his views on Christianity for a wide audience, Lewis was able to establish himself as a respected scholar in English literature. Representative of his work in this field is his scholarly work The Allegory of Love. According to Margaret Patterson Hannay in her C. S. Lewis, the work "introduces the reader first to the phenomenon of courtly love, then to the literary form of allegory, before presenting detailed studies of medieval allegory.… The book thus traces the form of allegorical love poetry from the late eleventh century to the late sixteenth century. Lewis argues that romantic love, something we assume as part of the nature of reality, is a relatively new phenomenon, unknown in classical, biblical, or early medieval times." The Allegory of Love includes "the best critical treatment in English of Chaucer's psychological romance, Troilus and Criseyde," as Charles A. Brady noted in America. A Times Literary Supplement contributor stated of The Allegory of Love: "This is plainly a great book—one which is destined to outlive its particular conclusions as few works of literary scholarship contrive to do.…The book is itself an allegory of love, a scholarly romance, in which a journey among works of poetry, many of them neglected, among erotic and scholastic treatises, most of them little read, is woven together into an imaginative and self-subsistent whole, and made available to the literate common reader as this material had never been before."

Just as the interplay of reason and imagination was instrumental in Lewis's conversion to theism and subsequently to Christianity, so it characterizes the body of writings that flowed from his pen in the following years. Propelled by the conviction that reason is related to truth, and imagination connects with meaning, Lewis communicates his ideas in myth, satire, and fantasy appealing to the imagination, as well as in didactic logical treatises, whose arguments address the intellect. Though critics have distinguished between these genres and assign his works to one category or another, many acknowledge the interplay within individual works. Cunningham observed: "His literary technique, even in his didactic writing where he relies so heavily on reason and logic, also depends for its impact on the myths, allegories, metaphors, analogies, epigrams, and illustrations provided by his imagination."

Among his academic colleagues, many believed Lewis's talents were best suited to strictly scholarly pursuits, but the author felt the need to speak to a wider audience. His science-fiction trilogy for adults achieved that goal. The trilogy commences in Out of the Silent Planet, continues in Perelandra, and ends in That Hideous Strength. While Christian ideas are primary to the works, they also contain mythic and literary themes, such as Greek and Roman fables and the Arthurian legends. Writing on the trilogy, A. K. Nardo in Extrapolation found that "as the reader travels with Ransom into Deep Heaven, he too is introduced to worlds where myth comes true and where what are merely artificial constructs to delineate kinds of poetry on earth become living realities in the heroic world of Mars and the pastoral world of Venus. Through identification with Ransom, the reader tastes what, Lewis seems to believe, is almost impossible in the modern world: pure epic and pure lyric experiences." Brady considered the "Miltonic grandeur of conception [in Out of the Silent Planet and Perelandra] the greatest exercise of pure imagination in immediately contemporary literature."

Out of the Silent Planet introduces the trilogy's main character, the reticent philologist, Dr. Elwin Ransom, who is kidnaped by an unscrupulous scientist, Dr. Weston, and Devine, his power-hungry accomplice. Weston and Devine transport Ransom to Mars via spaceship, intending him as a human sacrifice to placate the "wild" natives. However, the inhabitants of Malacandra, as they themselves call Mars, are far more civilized than the kidnappers, and they adopt Ransom, despite certain suspicions concerning his home planet. The Malacandrans view Earth with intense but careful curiosity, calling it the "silent planet," as it is wrapped in a dark veil that keeps it separated from the rest of the cosmos. Ransom comes to love the Malacandrans despite their peculiarities, and he unites with them in capturing Weston and Devine.

While Out of the Silent Planet received some negative criticism, it was generally popular with both ordinary readers and reviewers. As a piece of science fiction, the novel had its drawbacks, however. Brian Murphy noted in C. S. Lewis: "A reader of science fiction who delights in technical detail and scientific speculation had better pass on at once. What interests Lewis is what-would-happen-if; he imagines a space ship traveling to Mars and hasn't the slightest interest in how it might get there." Still, Lewis's friend J. R. R. Tolkien, who frequently disagreed with Lewis's literary approach to fantasy, was enthusiastic about the book. In The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, Humphrey Carpenter reprinted Tolkien's letter to publisher Stanley Unwin concerning a negative review of Out of the Silent Planet: "I read [Out of the Silent Planet] in the original MS. and was so enthralled that I could do nothing else until I had finished it. My first criticism was simply that it was too short.… I at any rate should have bought this story at almost any price if I had found it in print, and loudly recommended it as a 'thriller' by (however and surprisingly) an intelligent man."

Ransom's struggles with Weston continue in Perelandra. On this trip, Ransom is transported by supernatural beings to Venus, which is a watery Eden covered by floating islands. There Ransom meets a beautiful green woman who seems completely innocent of all evil. But Weston also appears, apparently sent by evil spirits. Eventually, the philologist realizes that he has been indeed sent to a second Eden, and that Weston is tempting the woman to disobey the few rules that have been established by the world's creator. Ransom finds that his job is to keep yet another planet from losing its Paradise. According to R. J. Reilly in Romantic Religion: A Study of Barfield, Lewis, Williams, and Tolkien, "The drama of the Incarnation takes on a strange new light in being told by a naked green woman on a floating island on Venus, as the Fall assumes new grandeur by being almost repeated." Leonard Bacon wrote in the Saturday Review that Perelandra "is the result of the poetic imagination in full blast and should never have been written in prose, however excellent." Bacon found the planet's "first couple" "a thoroughly interesting Eve and perhaps the only endurable Adam in literature." He concluded that Perelandra is "a truly remarkable book."

In the Atlantic, Chad Walsh explained Perelandra' s finale, which leads into That Hideous Strength, the longest and most complex novel in the series. "As Ransom prepares to return to the Earth, he has a long conversation with the Adam of Venus, and learns that exciting events may be expected on the Earth in a few years. For countless centuries the Earth has been in the grip of the Devil and his assistants, but there are signs that the final struggle is approaching; the Earth may be delivered from evil, and contact re-established between it and the uncorrupted planets." That Hideous Strength "represents Lewis's most complex and impressive use of myth in fiction," wrote Charles Moorman in College English. The plot focuses on a young married couple who experience the explosion of their quiet university world by the invasion of a revolutionary group known as N.I.C.E. (National Institute of Coordinated Experiments). The wife, Jane Studdock, finds herself on one side of the conflict, headed by Ransom, who is now known as Mr. Fisher-King, while her sociologist husband, Mark, lands on the other, which is apparently led by Devine in his new identity as Lord Feverstone.

Moorman wrote that in That Hideous Strength "Lewis's theme is not a theological dogma, but a moral dilemma. Lewis is here opposing the sanctity and morality of Mr. Fisher-King, who symbolizes the whole weight of an ordered and Christian society, and the chaotic and turbulent secularism of the N.I.C.E. The war between these forces, and thus, in terms of the silent planet myth, between the angels and devils who direct them, is reflected in the inward struggles of a young couple, Mark and Jane Studdock, to choose sides in the great battle, and it is their personal struggles which become the real subject of the last novel." In the Dictionary of Literary Biography Eugene McGovern observed that "Lewis packs That Hideous Strength with scenes from college politics, bureaucracy, journalism, and married life, and he has much to say about academic ambition, education, equality and obedience, language and abuses of it, scientism and social science, vivisection, magic, the legend of King Arthur, and medieval cosmology.… All of this is kept under an impressive control, with the many discursive elements never interfering with the narrative."

The Screwtape Letters contains some of the twentieth-century's best-known descriptions of the bureaucracy of Hell. As the title indicates, the novel's form is a series of letters: all are from Uncle Screwtape, a senior devil, to his nephew, Wormwood, a junior tempter, who is endeavoring to lure a malleable young man to damnation. But the devils find themselves in competition with the Church and with a young Christian woman, whom the demons find "nauseating." Bacon wrote in the Saturday Review of Literature that "whatever you may think of the theses of Mr. Lewis … the fact remains that [The Screwtape Letters] is a spectacular and satisfactory nova in the bleak sky of satire." A Commonweal reviewer felt that while Lewis's "comments on marriage seem inadequate, the author exhibits a remarkable knowledge of human nature." And P. W. Wilson recounted in the New York Times Thomas More's observation that the devil "'cannot endure to be mocked,' and which, if correct, means that somewhere in the inferno there must be considerable annoyance."

" Till We Have Faces has a special place in [Lewis's] work: the object of either extravagant praise or silent neglect, the novel has an oddly tentative quality," Murphy wrote. "Lewis explored wonderingly in this difficult novel.… deeply his own past, his own deepest dreams, and his own deeply hidden images of God." While Till We Have Faces was the author's favorite work, this unusually dark and puzzling novel has confused readers and critics alike. Although it builds on the themes of sin and redemption, Till We Have Faces operates in a pre-Christian world. The story takes place in the violent, barbaric realm of Glome, where the only civilizing force is expressed through a Greek slave tutor, known as the Fox. "The driving motif of Till We Have Faces is the development of the soul, a motif explored allegorically in one of [Lewis's] earliest works, The Pilgrim's Regress. Here Lewis has recast the familiar myth of Cupid and Psyche," noted John H. Timmerman in Religion in Life. The familiar story is altered by perspective: it is told first-person, from the view of Psyche's ugly and embittered older sister, Orual, who eventually becomes the queen of Glome. Till We Have Faces is Orual's story, and relates how she becomes harmful to her beloved sister, whom she loves possessively. McGovern felt that the novel displays Lewis's skill in psychological characterization. "Not before Till We Have Faces did Lewis show he could produce a complete and thoroughly convincing portrait, and in this novel he has not one but three impressive creations," and mentions Orual, the Fox, and the faithful soldier, Bardia. Timmerman also saw depth in the work, and stated, "The philosophic cast to the novel is stronger than in any other of [Lewis's] work."

Lewis's seven-volume series for children, "The Chronicles of Narnia," is considered his best-loved popular work, and the series has become a classic in children's literature. Interestingly, Lewis did not set out to write for children; rather, he saw in the type of literature that appealed to children an opportunity to explore the themes which interested him. As David L. Russell observed in the Dictionary of Literary Biography, "The medium proved ideal for Lewis's purpose, for he was able to avoid preaching and yet to portray with great clarity his own vision of Christian faith." The stories rely heavily on Christian ideas, but traces of Greek and Roman mythology also surface in its pages, as do elements of the medieval romance. Some critics have mistaken parts of the fairy tales—in particular the first volume, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe—for a direct allegory of Christ's death and resurrection, but in Of Other Worlds: Essays and Stories, Walter Hooper introduced Lewis's comments on his initial creation of the fantastic country of Narnia: "Everything began with images; a faun carrying an umbrella, a queen on a sledge, a magnificent lion. At first there wasn't even anything Christian about them; that element pushed itself in of its own accord." In the same volume, Hooper presented Lewis's recollection of how he planned the stories to communicate with readers who were uninterested in God: "I thought I saw how stories of this kind could steal past a certain inhibition which had paralysed much of my own religion in childhood. Why did one find it so hard to feel as one was told one ought to feel about God or about the sufferings of Christ? I thought the chief reason was that one was told one ought to.…But supposing that by casting all these things into an imaginary world, stripping them of their stained-glass and Sunday school associations, one could make them for the first time appear in their real potency? Could one not thus steal past those watchful dragons? I thought one could."

The Narnia stories concern varying groups of children who first come into contact with the "other world" of Narnia while living in rural England during the bombing of London during World War II. The first and most famous group, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie, are introduced in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. They have been separated from their parents and are lodging with a kindly, but remote, old professor in his large country estate. During a rainstorm they engage in a game of hide and seek, and Lucy runs into a large wardrobe that turns out to be a doorway into Narnia. Eventually, Lucy's brothers and sister also find Narnia, and what follows is an adventure-packed tale that includes themes of betrayal, forgiveness, death, and rebirth. In this opening volume, Lewis "presents a world corrupted with powerful evil, full of dangerous temptations; humanity is seen as often weak and prone to erring ways," David L. Russell explained, "but with the capacity for devotion and even heroism if guided by the unconditional love of the godhead."

The rest of the Narnia chronicles concern further adventures in Narnia and touch similar themes, but they involve different characters. As the Pevensie children mature, they become "too old" to visit, and a younger cousin and his friend eventually become the new explorers. The chronicles close with Narnia's end: in the final book, The Last Battle, Lewis intertwines the New Testament book of the Revelation into Narnia's history, and concludes an "earthly" world with the opening of an eternal one.

Murphy maintained that Lewis's style grew throughout the Narnia chronicles. In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Lewis's "tone is a bit self-consciously avuncular, even the slightest bit condescending," the critic wrote. "But by the second story, Prince Caspian, he has an assured and simple narrative tone which becomes, by the end of the Chronicles, a genuinely noble and serious 'high' style—almost a development of and improvement on the style William Morris … adopted for his romances."

Despite the Narnia books' continual popularity with children, Lewis's series was not altogether successful with adults. According to Use of English contributor Peter Hollindale, "The structure of power in Narnia, with Aslan at its head, is enforced by battle, violence, retributive justice, pain and death. Anything which challenges the power is either evil or stupid, and frequently both." Penelope Lively added in another issue of the same periodical that there exists an "underlying savagery that … makes the books … sinister, and the more so because this is what emerges as the most convincing thing about them." Perhaps the problem some critics had with the powerful Aslan, the talking lion who is the series' Christ-figure, is the author's conception of goodness. Hooper, in Imagination and the Spirit: Essays in Literature and the Christian Faith, described this as "none of the mushy, goody-goody sort of thing we sometimes find in people we feel we ought to like, but cannot. Here, in this magnificent Lion, is absolute goodness beyond anything we could imagine. Qualities we sometimes think of as opposites meet in him and blend." Lewis reconciled many apparent opposites in Aslan's character, where ferocity mingles with tenderness, and sternness is balanced by humor.

Surprised by Joy is Lewis's chronicle of his own life, and here he explains how his early childhood led up to his conversion to Christianity. The author approached his own story as he would his fiction or his essays. Nation contributor May Swenson called the "long drawn out and intricate conversion … fascinating because of [Lewis's] intellect and charm, plus the story-telling dexterity of a topnotch mystery writer." T. S. Matthews, however, writing in the New York Times, wrote that the book left him "cold." Matthews continued, "In his clear, dry, take-it-or-leave-it manner, [Lewis] describes and tries to dissect the most incandescent of human emotions—and takes all the joy out of it." But while a Times Literary Supplement contributor agreed that the story "lacks the appalling, double-you-for-damnation sense of crisis which hangs over, say, that of Bunyan," he argued that "the tension of [the] final chapters holds the interest like the close of a thriller." Lewis's last years are recorded in A Grief Observed, written following his wife's death from cancer.

As Murphy noted: "Through all his work, but especially [the] last works, Lewis says that life is a preparation—not, as William Butler Yeats said, a preparation for something that never happens—but a readying for seeing God." Frequently controversial but continuing in popularity since his death, Lewis excited as much criticism as praise. McGovern quoted Helen Gardner, who said of the writer: "He aroused warm affection, loyalty, and devotion in his friends, and feelings of almost equal strength among innumerable persons who knew him only through his books. But he also aroused strong antipathy, disapproval, and distaste among some of his colleagues and pupils, and among some readers. It was impossible to be indifferent to him." In his belief that "man does not 'make himself,'" Lewis appeared as a reactionary to many twentieth-century minds. Patrick J. Callahan explained in Science Fiction: The Other Side of Realism—Essays on Modern Fantasy and Science Fiction Lewis's conviction: that man's "reason is capable of apprehending a rational universe, and thus, that there is a natural moral order. Such a stance places him in opposition to all principles of infinite human progress, to all philosophies of the superman. Lewis would accept Blake's maxim that 'in trying to be more than man, we become less.'"

Lewis's home, formerly known as the "Midden" and now called the "Kilns," was restored and opened to the public by the C. S. Lewis Foundation. The small house in suburban Oxford, England, where Lewis lived with his brother, Warren, and where he wrote the "Narnia Chronicles," is used as a center of study for Lewis scholars.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Authors & Artists for Young Adults, Volume 3, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1990.

Barratt, David, C. S. Lewis and His World, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1988.

Bramlett, Perry C., C. S. Lewis and Life at the Center: Prayer, Devotion, and Friendship, Peake (London, England), 1996.

Callahan, Patrick J., Science Fiction: The Other Side of Realism—Essays on Modern Fantasy and Science Fiction, edited by Thomas D. Clareson, Bowling Green University Popular Press (Bowling Green, OH), 1971.

Carpenter, Humphrey, The Inklings: C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, and Their Friends, Allen & Unwin (London, England), 1978.

Carter, Humphrey, and Christopher Tolkien, editors, The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, Allen & Unwin (London, England), 1981.

Children's Literature Review, Volume 3, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1978.

Christopher, Joe R., and Joan K. Ostling, C. S. Lewis: An Annotated Checklist of Writings about Him and His Works, Kent State University Press (Kent, OH), 1974.

Christopher, Joe R., C. S. Lewis, Twayne (Boston, MA), 1987.

Como, James T., editor, "C. S. Lewis at the Breakfast Table" and Other Reminiscences, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1979.

Contemporary Literary Criticism, Gale (Detroit, MI), Volume 1, 1973, Volume 3, 1975, Volume 6, 1976, Volume 14, 1980, Volume 27, 1984.

Cunningham, Richard B., C. S. Lewis: Defender of the Faith, Westminster Press (Philadelphia, PA), 1967.

Dictionary of Literary Biography, Gale (Detroit, MI), Volume 15: British Novelists, 1930-1959, 1983, Volume 100: Modern British Essayists, Second Series, 1990, Volume 160: British Children's Writers, 1914-1960, 1996.

Downing, David C., Planets in Peril: A Critical Study of C. S. Lewis's Ransom Trilogy, University of Massachusetts Press (Amherst, MA), 1992.

Duriez, Colin, The C. S. Lewis Handbook, Baker Books (Grand Rapids, MI), 1990.

Edwards, Bruce I., editor, The Taste of the Pineapple: Essays on C. S. Lewis As Reader, Critic, and Imaginative Writer, Bowling Green State University Press (Bowling Green, OH), 1988.

Ford, Paul F., Companion to Narnia, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 1980.

Gibb, Jocelyn, editor, Light on C. S. Lewis, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1976.

Gibson, Evan K., C. S. Lewis, Spinner of Tales: A Guide to His Fiction, Christian University Press (Grand Rapids, MI), 1980.

Glaspey, Terry W., Not a Tame Lion; The Spiritual Legacy of C. S. Lewis, Cumberland House (Nashville, TN), 1996.

Glover, Donald E., C. S. Lewis: The Art of Enchantment, Ohio University Press (Athens, OH), 1981.

Goffar, Janine, The C. S. Lewis Index: A Comprehensive Guide to Lewis's Writings, Crossway Books (Wheaton, IL), 1998.

Gormley, Beatrice, C. S. Lewis: Christian and Storyteller, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1997.

Green, Roger Lancelyn, and Walter Hooper, C. S. Lewis: A Biography, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1974, reprinted, 1994.

Gresham, Douglas H., Lenten Lands, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 1994.

Griffin, William, Clive Staples Lewis: The Drama of a Life, Harper & Row (San Francisco, CA), 1986.

Hannay, Margaret Patterson, C. S. Lewis, Ungar (New York, NY), 1981.

Hooper, Walter, Imagination and the Spirit: Essays in Literature and the Christian Faith, edited by Charles A. Huttar, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1971.

Hooper, Walter, Past Watchful Dragons: The Narnian Chronicles of C. S. Lewis, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1974.

Hooper, Walter, C. S. Lewis: A Companion and Guide, HarperSanFrancisco (San Francisco, CA), 1996.

Howard, Thomas, C. S. Lewis, Man of Letters: A Reading of His Fiction, Churchman (Worthing, England), 1987.

Karkainen, Paul A., Narnia Explored, F. H. Revell (Old Tappan, NJ), 1979.

Knight, Gareth, The Magical World of the Inklings: J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Charles Williams, Owen Barfield, Element Books (Dorset, England), 1990.

Lewis, C. S., Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1956.

Lewis, C. S., Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1966.

Lewis, C. S., Of Other Worlds: Essays and Stories, edited by Walter Hooper, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1967.

Lindskoog, Kathryn Ann, and David Mortimer, Finding the Landlord: A Guidebook to C. S. Lewis's "The Pilgrim's Regress," Cornerstone Press (Chicago, IL), 1995.

Lindskoog, Kathryn Ann, and Patrick Wynne, Light in the Shadow Lands: Protecting the Real C. S. Lewis, Multnomah Books (Portland, OR), 1994.

Lindskoog, Kathryn, Journey into Narnia, Hope Publishing House (Pasadena, CA), 1997.

Lindskoog, Kathryn, C. S. Lewis, Mere Christian, Cornerstone Press (Chicago, IL), 1997.

Lindvall, Terry, Surprised by Laughter: The Comic World of C. S. Lewis, Star Song (Nashville, TN), 1995.

Macdonald, Michael H., and Andrew A. Tadie, editors, The Riddle of Joy: G. K. Chesterton and C. S. Lewis, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1989.

Manlove, C. N., C. S. Lewis: His Literary Achievement, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1987.

Menuge, Angus, editor, C. S. Lewis, Light-Bearer in the Shadowlands: The Evangelistic Vision of C. S. Lewis, Crossway Books (Wheaton, IL), 1997.

Mills, David, editor, The Pilgrim's Guide: C. S. Lewis and the Art of Witness, W. B. Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1998.

Milward, Peter, A Challenge to C. S. Lewis, Associated University Presses (London, England), 1995.

Murphy, Brian, C. S. Lewis, Starmont House (Mercer Island, WA), 1983.

Musacchio, George, C. S. Lewis, Man & Writer: Essays and Reviews, University of Mary Hardin-Baylor (Belton, TX), 1994.

Myers, Doris T., C. S. Lewis in Context, Kent State University Press (Kent, OH), 1994.

Payne, Leanne, Real Presence: The Glory of Christ with Us and within Us, Baker Books (North Dartmouth, MA), 1995.

Peters, Thomas C., Simply C. S. Lewis: A Beginner's Guide to the Life and Works of C. S. Lewis, Cross-way Books (Wheaton, IL), 1997.

Reilly, R. J., Romantic Religion: A Study of Barfield, Lewis, Williams, and Tolkien, University of Georgia Press (Athens, GA), 1971.

Rossi, Lee D., The Politics of Fantasy: C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, UMI Research Press (Ann Arbor, MI), 1984.

St. James Guide to Fantasy Writers, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1996.

Sammons, Martha C., A Guide through Narnia, Shaw (Wheaton, IL), 1979.

Sayer, George, Jack: C. S. Lewis and His Times, Macmillan (London, England), 1988, published as Jack: A Life of C. S. Lewis, Crossway Books (Wheaton, IL), 1994.

Schakel, Peter, and Charles A. Huttar, editors, Word and Story in C. S. Lewis, University of Missouri Press (Columbia, MO), 1992.

Schakel, Peter, editor, The Longing for a Form: Essays on the Fiction of C. S. Lewis, Kent State University Press (Kent, OH), 1977.

Schultz, Jeffrey D., and John G. West, editors, The C. S. Lewis Readers' Encyclopedia, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1998.

Sibley, Brian, The Land of Narnia: Brian Sibley Explores the World of C. S. Lewis, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 1990.

Sims, John, Missionaries to the Skeptics: Christian Apologists for the Twentieth Century: C. S. Lewis, Edward John Carnell, and Reinhold Neibuhr, Mercer University Press (Macon, GA), 1995.

Tennyson, G. B., editor, Owen Barfield on C. S. Lewis, Wesleyan University Press (Middletown, CT), 1989.

Vander Elst, Philip, C. S. Lewis, Claridge (London, England), 1996.

Walker, Andrew, and James Patrick, editors, A Christian for All Christians: Essays in Honour of C. S. Lewis, Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1990.

Walsh, Chad, The Literary Legacy of C. S. Lewis, Harcourt (New York, NY), 1979.

Wilson, A. N., C. S. Lewis: A Biography, Norton (New York, NY), 1990.