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Remembering C S Lewis
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C S Lewis Remembered
If you have yet to read C.S. Lewis Remembered (2006 Zondervan), you are missing some great insights into the enigmatic author of such diverse books as The Chronicles of Narnia series, Mere Christianity, and English Literature in the Sixteenth Century excluding Drama. Remembered is a compilation of interviews with and essays by those who had contact with Lewis through the years as colleague, student, acquaintance or friend. It also includes a reprint of an interview on Science Fiction Lewis did for SFHorizons Magazine shortly before his death.
The picture that emerges of "Jack," as his friends called him, is of a highly intelligent scholar relentless in the pursuit of truth, yet winsomely jovial and generous to a fault. The contributors for this book do not all share Lewis's faith, but they are all admirers. And those who are believers are not all of the same "stripe" of Christianity. Many comment how Lewis, while living out his Faith, did not try to "ram it down their throats."
In the 1950's Dorothy L. Sayers1, author of the play The Man Born to Be King, wrote an essay for the magazine World Theater (Winter 1955-56) titled "Playwrights are not Evangelists." Her argument was that Christian playwrights should above all strive to produce good plays, rather than merely seek to evangelize. "A drama (or any other work of art) will not by itself make anybody a Christian. It can provoke attention and stir the heart..." but not convert the soul.
What Sayers wrote about playwrights applies equally to the works of Lewis, including his so-called theological works. When he set out to write a novel, it is doubtful his primary consideration was to manipulate people in order to turn them to God. He was seeking to write a good story.2 Nor did he assume that his non-fiction would create Christians. Certainly his desire was to be convincing, but he knew that intellectual persuasion and emotional manipulation are not the same as conversion. Salvation comes by the Word of God through the power of the Spirit of God. (1 Peter 1:23, Romans 10:17, Titus 3:5)
Perhaps the most persuasive argument for Christianity is a life well lived. C. S. Lewis lived his faith, as testified by those who knew him. Christians should strive to be the best they can be in whatever vocation in which they find themselves. If you are a playwright, be the best playwright you can be. If you are a laborer, be the best laborer you can be. Good craftsmanship, whether cerebral or physical, will not convert the soul, but hopefully it will "provoke interest" so that you can be a positive influence.
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1Sayers was an Oxford graduate who was friend of Lewis, mostly through written correspondence, and admirer of Charles Williams, a member of the Inklings--a writers group that included Lewis and JRR Tolkien. She is famous for her "religious" plays performed during World War 2, and her earlier Lord Peter Wimsey detective stories.
2C S Lewis wrote in his essay “Of Other Worlds”
Some people seem to think that I began by asking myself how I could say something about Christianity to children; then fixed on the fairy tale as an instrument; then collected information about child-psychology and decided what age-group I’d write for; then drew up a list of basic Christian truths and hammered out “allegories” to embody them. This is all pure moonshine. I couldn’t write in that way at all. 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. It was part of the bubbling.
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