The Narnian

Just read the intro and ch 1 in The Narnian: The Life and Inagination of C S Lewis, by Alan Jacobs. I'm actually listening to it on my iPod while I read the book, the audiobook is read by Alan Jacobs, so that's kinda cool.

Jacobs says that while his book is "almost a biography," his aim was to write "the life of a mind, the story of an imagination." An early indication of this is his focus on CSL's experience of solitude, beginning with the death of his mother. Jacobs looks at the results of this: reading lots of books, creating imaginary worlds with his brother, and developing a sense of self that allowed Lewis to act as an individual. He reminds us that Lewis said he wrote children's books because nobody wrote the sort of books he wanted to read. Another interesting effect of CSL's early collaboration with Warnie is what Jacobs identifies as Lewis's quality of "syncretism": "a taste for syncretism is one of his cardinal traits, and it ultimately became for him a matter of theological principle" (13). He ties this in to the way in which the Lewis boys blended their individual worlds: Warnie's India and Jack's Animal Land are, he notes, blended into the one world of Boxen. I don't think I ever really understood this before, and I look forward to seeing what Jacobs makes of this in Lewis's later writing.

He quotes from Barfield's essay, "The Five C. S. Lewises," which I don't recall reading--so that will have to go on the list. Jacob's suggests that one distinctive quality of Lewis's mind was his "willingness to be enchanted . . . . an openness to delight, to the sense that there's more to the world than meets the eye, to the possibility that anything could happen to the one who is ready to meet that anything" (xxi). Again, I'll be interested to see what he makes of this regarding Lewis's fiction. I think, having just re-read the trilogy, that I see evidence of this in Jane and Mark in That Hideous Strength; at first neither of them is ready to "see" reality, but Lewis develops their characters until they both can let their guard down and accept, with delight, what is real and true; then they become the sort of people who can live lives of obedience and fulfillment.

Well, the book is good so far, and I'm enjoying Jacobs reading voice--though it's so smooth that I dozed off for a couple minutes. But that's not his fault--it's been a long day.