During the first part of May 2009, I presented a small conference on C. S. Lewis at Christ Covenant Church in Lawrence, Kansas. The local newspaper, The Lawrence Journal-World, ran a brief precede for the conference. Below is the three-question interview.
You will be talking about why C.S. Lewis is so popular. Without giving away the entire speech, can you sum up why you think his writings have struck a chord?
One of the most simple and immediately obvious reasons why Lewis was, is, and (in my view) will continue to be popular, is that he was a good writer. When asked by an interviewer how a Christian writer ought to go about developing a style, Lewis responded that a writer must “know exactly what he wants to say,” and “be sure he is saying exactly that” [1]. While masterfully using analogy, metaphor, and other literary devices to illustrate his thoughts, he never got lost in an illustration. Pick up any Lewis book or article, and you will notice a distinct absence of what writing students call “fluff.”
But, of course, one does not become popular by being an expert in syntax, diction, and metaphor. The reason he was able to effectively communicate was, first, because he had something really worth communicating, and second, because he often wrote to a popular audience. In the first place, he firmly believed that unless you could “explain a thing to any sensible person whatever (provided he will listen), then you don’t really understand it yourself” [2]. His clarity of writing testifies to his clarity of understanding. In the second place, he was aware of the tendency for the “high brow” intelligentsia to write only for their fellow high brows. This may have a place in the context of scholarly investigation and research, but it does nothing for the intellectual and social wall between the scholar and the layman. Worse, it only reinforces it. Though he was scorned and criticized by his fellow professors for it, he sought to help bridge that gap by using his scholarly knowledge and rhetorical ability to teach, encourage, and persuade, rather than alienate, the common man or woman. And the truly remarkable thing is that he did it without “dumbing down” the ideas. For example, the average person can read Book 1 of Mere Christianity, and, without knowing it, be reading about some of the core distinctions in value theory discussed by philosophers today. Even when dealing with the most complicated of theological and philosophical issues, he was able to respect their complexity without resorting to esoteric jargon.
Being proficient with the mind and pen is enough to secure notoriety. But the more I study C. S. Lewis, the more I believe the deepest explanation for his popularity is simpler still. In my opinion, he is one of “The Greats.” He was more than just a philosophy tutor, or an author of children’s fantasy, or a science fiction novelist, or a Christian apologist, or a professor of 16th century English literature—though the combination of all these in one individual is extraordinary. On the intellectual level, he combined natural ability with hard work and dedication. For example, by age 16, he was reading original works in Latin, Italian, French, Greek, and German (though he never became fully proficient in German). It is no small wonder he was an educational misfit until he entered Oxford!
But he not only had a prodigious intelligence, he was, after his conversion, a man of virtue. For most of the Greeks, philosophy was inseparable from character. So, too, with Lewis. Once he embraced Christianity, he took seriously its moral teachings. But his moral greatness did not lie in any predisposition toward virtue. His personal reflections in Surprised by Joy, and the commentary of his biographers reveal quite the opposite. In the words of Derek Brewer, one of Lewis’s students at Oxford, Lewis “was a very good man, to whom goodness did not come easily” [3]. But that is precisely my point: he was a very good man. Not perfect, but good.
Thus, considering him both as an individual in the common struggle with the World, the Flesh, and the Devil, and as a significant contributor to our Western intellectual heritage, in my view he stands in the tradition of the great pillars like Augustine, Aquinas, Boethius, Pascal, etc… When Lewis scholars like Peter Kreeft recommend Mere Christianity as the best book, second only to the Gospels, to help someone understand Christianity, we ought to sit up and take notice [4]. Scholars, and especially philosophers (as is Kreeft), are not prone to exaggeration.
1. Why do you yourself find him so interesting?
I approach Lewis from at least three different perspectives. First, as a student of philosophy, with special interests in philosophy of religion, I have long been interested in Lewis’s philosophical views. As already noted, most of his popular works are written to a general audience. But having studied and taught philosophy at Oxford, he was by no means ignorant of the perennial problems faced by philosophers through history. The result is a highly accessible text, but his developed views, and even his suppositions, go far deeper than the average modern popular writer. Though he never claimed to give a comprehensive account of the philosophical issues with which he dealt (for example, issues like freewill, divine foreknowledge, the problem of God and evil, etc…), he, nevertheless, provides enough meat for the philosophically minded to chew on. It may be of interest that though I have always been intrigued with Lewis, I have not always agreed with his conclusions, often thinking them too simplistic. But now, at the end of my undergraduate training in philosophy, the philosophical common ground between Lewis and me has increased. Whether my graduate studies will continue to close the gap, I cannot say. But I can say that I have come to a new appreciation of the Lewisian type of simplicity; that is, a simplicity which is the result, not of avoiding complexity, but of working through it and coming out on the other side.
Second, I approach Lewis from a literary perspective. I would not classify myself as a “literary” person, nor even a “literate” person, in the sense of being thoroughly familiar with all the great literary works of history. But I love literature, and I love writing. Lewis has, in fact, been largely responsible for my interest in books at all (see the next question). In my early teenage years, I had no use for any type of literature unless it was a “how-to” manual. But my perspective has radically changed. And it has been a delightful experience, along with a growing love for the rigor of logic and philosophical analysis, to delight in the simple joy and power of reading well-crafted fiction. This was a joy Lewis tapped into quite early in his life, and after his conversion, he used its power for great good. Though Lewis’s Perelandra is, without a doubt, a masterpiece, I concur with Lewis’s own opinion, that his last novel, Till We Have Faces, was his finest fictional work.
Third, I approach Lewis with a shared interest in Christian apologetics. I was introduced to Lewis through the writing and speaking of Ravi Zacharias—a debt which I can never repay. It was through these and other men’s deep concern and thoughtful interaction with intellectual questions that God breathed life into me. It was like emerging from a crack in the ground. I had no idea people even thought that deeply. But once I found that they did, I knew I had to start down the same road. Thus, my spiritual journey did not begin in agnosticism, and end when I found Christ to be the answer to life’s questions; it began with a refreshing introduction to solid Christian thinkers. But there is a certain danger to learning the answer before the question. I would zealously embrace some explanation or answer. Then, the more I read, I begin to realize the deep significance of the question, which in turn caused me to suspect the answer I had originally accepted. In short, since being introduced to Lewis, my life has consisted of many intellectual journeys “there and back again.” I consider it a mercy of God that he has allowed me to feel deeply the intellectual struggles—even encountering periods of extreme doubt—we all face to one degree or another. Heaven knows my upstart ego needed deflating. My life vision is, quite simply, to try to help others out of the same crack I was in. Lewis provides a tremendous model for how this can be done with grace, but with rigor.
2. How do his works relate to everyday Christians?
It is important for Christians (indeed, for all people) to recognize that there are different levels of discourse. If your 4 year old child asks you why trees are green, you would answer much differently than if your 16 year old asked you the same question. At the one level, a simple “because that’s how God made them” might suffice. And to launch into the physics of light wavelengths and pigment, and the inner workings of the eyeball would be entirely inappropriate. But the complex explanation may be entirely appropriate for the second question, for it is a much higher level of discourse. When we enter the realm of ideas, the same concept applies. All Christians should be able to articulate the “reason for their hope,” and should be able to answer the most common objections to it. That is why every Christian should read Mere Christianity and The Abolition of Man. But there are other levels of discourse that may be of little interest to some, while being of tremendous importance to others. For example, those who are internally conflicted about the problem of God and evil, or those who wonder how a rational person can believe in miracles, need to pursue answers on a higher plane. At this level, books like Miracles, the Problem of Pain, and Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer are particularly relevant. It is not as though Mere Christianity or The Abolition are in any way “shallower,” or written for “simple minded people.” Not at all! But they deal with questions with which every Christian must wrestle, while many of his other books have a tighter focus.
Thus, there is no single answer to the original question, for his works span genres and audience types. He wrote for his fellow scholars (works like English Literature in the 16th Century), for children (the Narnian collection), and almost everything in between. No matter what your interests, you are bound to find something that feeds your heart, soul, and mind in the Lewis corpus. But my advice to Lewis newcomers is to stretch yourself. If you are inclined to spend your hours in worlds of fantasy, try reading something that will test your intellect. Or, if you tend toward structures, arguments, and deductions (all good things!), fertilize your imagination by joining Ransom on his journey to Malacandra or Perelandra in Lewis’s Interplanetary Trilogy. And above all, read other authors too. If Lewis were alive and found out that you had confined yourself to his writings alone, be sure a reprimand would be coming your way!
Notes:
[1] “Cross Examination,” an interview with C. S. Lewis, in God in the Dock, Walter Hooper, ed. (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1970), 263.
[2] C. S. Lewis, “Before We Can Communicate,” in God in the Dock, 256-57.
[3] Jedd Medefind, He Doesn’t Have Ingrown Eyeballs: Peter Kreeft on C. S. Lewis (Oct. 23) <http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics-more/interview_cslewis.htm>.
[4] Derek Brewer, “The Tudor: A Portrait,” in Remembering C. S. Lewis: Recollections of Those Who Knew Him, James Como ed. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992), 147.
