History Commons^™

Review Of The Completion Of C. S. Lewis: From War To Joy, Crystal Hurd

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Harry Lee Poe, The Completion of C. S. Lewis: From War to Joy (1945-1963), (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2022), 352 pages plus notes and index, $34.99, ISBN 9781433571022.

Review Of The Unknown Garden Of Another’S Heart: The Surprising Friendship Between C. S. Lewis And Arthur Greeves, Jason Lepojärvi

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Joseph A. Kohm Jr., The Unknown Garden of Another’s Heart: The Surprising Friendship between C. S. Lewis and Arthur Greeves (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2022). 114 pages. $21.00. ISBN 9781666710403.

Review Of The Undiscovered C. S. Lewis: Essays In Memory Of Christopher W. Mitchell, Brian C. Roden

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Bruce R. Johnson, ed., The Undiscovered C. S. Lewis: Essays in Memory of Christopher W. Mitchell (Hamden, CT: Winged Lion Press, 2021). 389 pages. $24.99. ISBN 978193568813.

Review Of No Ordinary People: 21 Friendships Of C. S. Lewis, Josiah Peterson

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Joel D. Heck, No Ordinary People: 21 Friendships of C. S. Lewis (Hamden, CT: Winged Lion Press, 2021). 384 pages. $19.50. ISBN 9781935688228.

Review Of The Medieval Mind Of C. S. Lewis: How Great Books Shaped A Great Mind, William Gentrup

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Jason M. Baxter, The Medieval Mind of C. S. Lewis: How Great Books Shaped a Great Mind (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2022). 166 pages. $22.00. ISBN 9781514001646.

The Reading Life Of Young Jack Lewis, 1914-1917, Harry Lee Poe

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Excerpt: "What follows is a list of what young Lewis read for his lessons with W. T. Kirkpatrick (over 50 works) and what he read for pleasure (over 150 works). He probably read more than this, but this is all that can be documented. We know that he read many of these books two times or more while at Gastons, because his letters to Arthur Greeves every week were full of discussions of what he was reading at the time."

Three University College Tutors: Arthur Blackburne Poynton, E. F. Carritt, And George Hope Stevenson, Joel D. Heck

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

A study of the three most important tutors C. S. Lewis had as an undergraduate (Arthur Blackburne Poynton, E. F. Carritt, and George Hope Stevenson), and Lewis's relationship with them.

Which Image Triggered C. S. Lewis’S Enthusiasm For Wagner’S Ring Cycle?, Norbert Feinendegen

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

In his autobiography Surprised by Joy, C. S. Lewis recounts a seminal moment that occurred quite early in his life but had an enormous impact on his spiritual development....He saw one of Rackham’s paintings and at the same time read the words Siegfried and The Twilight of the Gods. This triggered an intense experience of Joy—the first since his childhood days—and established his lifelong fascination with Norse mythology....The actual source of Lewis’s teenage encounter with Northernness appears to have eluded biographers thus far. After an exhaustive search, I have only been able to find one issue of a contemporary literary …

Review Of The Intellectual World Of C. S. Lewis, J. Cameron Moore

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Alister E. McGrath, The Intellectual World of C. S. Lewis (Oxford, 2013). 191 pages. $32.95. ISBN: 9780470672792.

Review Of C. S. Lewis And The Middle Ages, William Gentrup

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Robert Boenig, C. S. Lewis and the Middle Ages (Kent, OH, 2012). 181 pages. $55.00. ISBN: 9781606351147.

C. S. Lewis As Spiritual Mentor By Mail, David C. Downing

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Lewis’ published correspondence provides a kind of autobiography-in-progress, and it offers a revealing glimpse of his opinions as a literary and culture critic. But perhaps the letters of most permanent value are those which Lewis saw as a part of his Christian vocation: his insights to friends, casual acquaintances and complete strangers about questions of theology, faith, spiritual formation, and even marriage and family relationships. In his later years, letter-writing became a burdensome task for Lewis. In one note, he mentions that he had composed thirty-five letters that day. In another, he mentions that he had just spent nine hours …

Review Of Becoming C. S. Lewis: A Biography Of Young Jack Lewis, Crystal Hurd

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of Harry Lee Poe, Becoming C. S. Lewis: A Biography of Young Jack Lewis (1898- 1918) (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019). 276 pages + notes and index. $22.99. ISBN 9781433562730.

In Memory: Walter Hooper (1931-2020), Steven A. Beebe

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

No abstract provided.

Review Of C.S. Lewis And Bede Griffiths: Chief Companions, William Gentrup

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of: Ron Dart, C.S. Lewis and Bede Griffiths: Chief Companions (Abbotsford, BC, Canada: St. Macrina Press, 2016). 62 pages. $9.95. ISBN 9781530176434

Review Of Women And C.S. Lewis, Jennifer Neyhart

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of: Carolyn Curtis and Mary Pomroy Key, eds., Women and C. S. Lewis (Oxford: Lion Hudson, 2015). 287 pages. $17.95. ISBN 9780745956947.

The Efforts Of C.S. Lewis To Aid British Prisoners Of War During World War Ii, Bruce R. Johnson

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Edward Sniders is not the only prisoner of war to have received counsel and encouragement from C. S. Lewis during World War II. In fact, Lewis found three different ways to support various British prisoners in their time of extreme need. He did this through supervising the selection of religious books sent to POW camp libraries, developing with J. R. R. Tolkien an English Literature study course and examination for POWs, and writing to individual prisoners. The present article will explore each of these three efforts.

Review Of Second Friends: C. S. Lewis And Ronald Knox In Conversation, Malcolm Guite

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Review of: Milton T. Walsh, Second Friends: C. S. Lewis and Ronald Knox in Conversation (San Francisco, 2008). 360 pages. $16.95. ISBN: 9781586172404.

Review Essay: C. S. Lewis And The Church. Essays In Honor Of Walter Hooper, Grayson Carter

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

An extended review of Judith Wolfe and Brendan N. Wolfe, eds., C. S. Lewis and the Church. Essays in Honor of Walter Hooper (London, 2001). xi + 193 pages. $110.00. ISBN: 9780567047366

"A Dreadful Thing": C.S. Lewis And The Experinces Of War, Timothy J. Demy

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

From a Christian perspective, war entails the death and killing of people who are all created in the image of God and therefore have inherent dignity and incalculable worth. And yet, even after experiencing war at firsthand, C. S. Lewis believed that war is sometimes justifiable and necessary.

Like others of his generation, Lewis was deeply affected by the experience of war. He lived through the First and Second World Wars, serving as an officer on the Western Front between November 1917 and April 1918. His brother Warren (“Warnie”) was a career officer serving in the British army in both …

"Answers That Belonged To Life": C.S. Lewis And The Origins Of The Royal Air Force Chaplains' School, Cambridge, Bruce R. Johnson

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Excerpt: "In an earlier age, when the strength of the nation was tested to its limits, RAF chaplains and others gathered in Cambridge for instruction, refreshment, retreat, and spiritual renewal. While many of the most significant Christian luminaries of the age were engaged to lecture at the school, some were clearly more effective than others. Of these, Lewis appears to have offered chaplains a measure of clarity when it was most needed. He gave them answers that belonged to life. And while his contributions to the war effort could hardly be considered meritorious by the admittedly high standards of the …

A Friend's Death: C.S. Lewis' Disagreement With St. Augustine, Jason Lepojärvi

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Lewis did nothing to conceal his admiration of—and theological pedigree to—Augustine: as he wrote, Augustine “is a great saint and a great thinker to whom my old glad debts are incalculable.”3 This is why the only time he explicitly disagrees with Augustine on an important point concerning love, he does so “with trembling.”4 Lewis’ sentiments in having to disagree with Augustine may be comparable to Stanley Hauerwas disagreeing with Lewis. It is difficult, Hauerwas wrote, “to criticize a writer who has done so much good as C. S. Lewis.”5 The purpose of the present article is to evaluate the gentlemanly …

Review Of The Shared Witness Of C. S. Lewis And Austin Farrer. Friendship, Influence, And An Anglican Worldview, Grayson Carter

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Grayson Carter: Review of Philip Irving Mitchell, The Shared Witness of C. S. Lewis and Austin Farrer. Friendship, Influence, and an Anglican Worldview (Kent, Ohio: The Kent State University Press, 2021). 312 pages. $55.00. ISBN 9781606354179.

A Message In A Bottle: C.S. Lewis's American Epistolary Friendships, Bruce L. Edwards

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

The first French conference focused on C. S. Lewis was held at Lille Catholic University in June 2011. Bruce L. Edwards delivered a plenary talk there exploring the theme of friendship as demonstrated in the correspondence between Lewis and his American readers. Edwards had intended to revise this address for inclusion in the memorial volume dedicated to his friend Chris Mitchell. Edwards died in 2015 while still making revisions to the draft below.

The Friends Of C.S. Lewis, Walter Hooper

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

A series of talks was given at Grandpont House, Oxford in 2013 to mark the half-century anniversary of C. S. Lewis’s death and the fortieth anniversary of J. R. R. Tolkien’s passing. The address by Walter Hooper focused on memories of C. S. Lewis and his friends and took that story up to Lewis’s death on 22 November 1963.1 The essay below, given on a different occasion,2 is a complementary address covering the period from 1963 to the death of Owen Barfield in 1997. Hooper himself passed away in 2020.

Cousin To Cousin: Joy Davidman's Correspondence With Edward Rosenthal, Don W. King

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

The focus of the smaller collection below—comprised of six letters and postcards written between 1950 and 1960—is Joy’s correspondence with her first cousin, Edward (aka Eddie or Eddy) Rosenthal. Rosenthal was the son of Henry and Rebecca Rosenthal; Rebecca was the sister of Joy’s mother, Jennette Davidman, and thus Joy’s aunt. Rosenthal worked at the Los Angeles Examiner (est. 1903-62), a newspaper founded by William Randolph Hearst. The subjects of their correspondence include discussion of family members, notably Joy’s husband Bill Gresham as well as her sons David and Douglas, and a number of other extended kindred. Other topics are …

Seven Letters Of Warren Lewis To June Flewett, Don W. King

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Excerpt: June loved both Jack and Warnie, and she remembered Warnie with particular affection: “He was amusing and enjoyed playing the crusty old bachelor. He and Jack listened to classical music on an old gramophone with a huge wooden horn. I was sometimes invited to join them for this in Jack’s study. I do not remember ever seeing him in a bad mood. . . . In the two years that I shared his home he was consistently kind and courteous to me and I was very fond of him.” The seven letters that follow underscore Warnie’s deep affection for …

Review Of Our Of My Bone: The Letters Of Joy Davidman, Suzanne Bray

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Suzanne Bray: Review of Don W. King, ed., Out of My Bone: The Letters of Joy Davidman (Grand Rapids, 2009). xxxi + 421 pages. 22 b&w photos. $28.00. ISBN 9780802863997.

Review Of Mere Christians: Inspiring Stories Of Encounters With C.S. Lewis, Will Vaus

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Will Vaus: Review of Andrew Lazo and Mary Anne Phemister, eds., Mere Christians: Inspiring Stories of Encounters with C. S. Lewis (Grand Rapids, 2009). 222 pages. $14.99. ISBN 9780801071843.

C.S. Lewis, Public Intellectual, Samuel Joeckel

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Despite such hints and evocations, it appears that no one has attempted a systematic analysis of Lewis as a public intellectual. That is, no one has methodically employed extant theories on the concept of the public intellectual to assess how (or even whether) he fits the bill. No one has used these theories as an interpretive lens for analyzing Lewis’ writings. No one has analyzed the historical conditions during Lewis’ lifetime that pushed him into the role of public intellectual. No one has explored how Lewis adheres to the conventions of public discourse, the language of the public intellectual. And …

Interview With Walter Hooper, Mark Neal

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

Interview with Walter Hooper