by Clifford Morris (An address delivered on BBC Radio Oxford in 1971. First published in the Portland C. S. Lewis Chronicle.) As an ordinary person with no special qualifications, save that he called himself my friend, I want to share with you some of my memories of the late Clive Staples Lewis, Master of Arts, Doctor of Literature, Doctor of Read More ›
On December 18, 1912, when Lewis was fourteen years old, Charles Dawson, an attorney, and Arthur Smith Woodward, the British Museum’s leading paleontologist, announced to the world that they had discovered an early human fossil in a shallow gravel pit near the village of Piltdown in Sussex. This was promptly accepted as the earliest known human fossil and was the pride Read More ›
A startling inquiry appeared on the MERELEWIS listserve on 2 January 2000. Karen Welbourn reported that when C. S. Lewis was mentioned on another listserve, someone there responded with the following: I find C. S. Lewis a very interesting author. As you may know, he not only wrote for children, but he also wrote … [other genres] … and science Read More ›
The national symbol of Japan happened to be an important symbol to C. S. Lewis. In the last paragraph of The Great Divorce (1946) he wrote about the ultimate sunrise — “the rim of the sunrise that shoots Time dead with golden arrows and puts to flight all phantasmal shapes.” (See also the ending of Till We Have Faces.) On Read More ›
In April 2000 the first issue of the revamped Mythlore: A Journal of J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Charles Williams and Mythopoeic Literature was published. It is now an 81-page academic quarterly journal edited by Theodore James Sherman of Middle Tennessee State University. Two of the six essays in this issue are about C. S. Lewis: “Three Views Read More ›
David Payne’s first two plays about C. S. Lewis are now supplemented by “Target Practice.” Here is an excerpt from his advertising. [Note: Payne thinks the Screwtape Letters idea came to Lewis on 30 July 1940. But it came on 21 July, eight days before Hitler’s persuasive 29 July broadcast.] World War II was raging. Hitler was on the shores Read More ›
In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader C. S. Lewis described Harold and Alberta Scrubb, Eustace’s parents, as vegetarians, non-smokers, and teetotallers — who wore a special kind of underclothes. Fifty years later, readers are familiar with vegetarians, non-smokers, and teetotallers, but most are mystified by Lewis’s reference to a special kind of underclothes. Strict Mormons are teetotallers and non-smokers Read More ›
Since writing “The Dark Tower: A Challenge to Lewis Scholars” (Legacy 84), I’ve noticed a few more echoes of That Hideous Strength in The Dark Tower. In That Hideous Strength, Mark Studdock is imprisoned in a room that is covered, wherever he looks, with decorations not explicitly demonic but having a subtle cumulative effect that is dehumanizing (ch. 13). According Read More ›
Conference in Milan: “Clive Staples Lewis critico della Modernita.” On Saturday, December 11, 1999 the first Italian C. S. Lewis conference took place. Most of the speakers were Italian, but there were two from Oxford: Andrew Paul Cuneo, President of Oxford University Lewis Society, spoke on “The Principle of Hierarchy in C.S. Lewis,” and Walter Hooper gave the keynote address, Read More ›
BOOKS BY LEGACY READERS The Drawing of the Dark by Tim Powers (Del Rey, paperback reissue, 1999). This historical fantasy set in 16th century Europe draws on the legend of the Fisher King. First published in 1979 it has been translated into French, Czech, Italian, and Polish. Declare by Tim Powers will be released this year by Avon, but 26 Read More ›