History Commons^™

C.S. Lewis's Lost Arthurian Poem: A Conjectural Essay, Joe R. Christopher

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

C.S. Lewis aficionados know his unfinished "Launcelot," collected in Narrative Poems; but fewer know that he wrote an Arthurian poem intended for his first book, Spirits in Bondage, which was rejected by his publisher. The manuscript has since been lost, but a few things can be known or reasonably conjectured about the poem. This paper will cover the following topics:

(1) Lewis's mention of the poem in his correspondence with Arthur Greeves,

(2) its title,

(3) its date of composition,

(4) its source (quoted),

(5) its probably application for Spirits in Bondage, and

(6) the loss of …

The Pedagogical Value Of The Screwtape Letters For A New Generation, Brenton Dickieson

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters launched a genre of demonic epistolary fiction. Intriguingly, we have seen Screwtape-style letters about psychotherapy, (anti-) creativity, pedagogy, and scientific research. Evidently, Screwtape continues to be relevant among contemporary writers, but is it relevant to students? From the results of a spiritual perspective survey and various teaching methods in a secular undergraduate class, and including the analysis of ninety-five student-created Screwtape letters of cultural critique, we see that the genre of demonic epistolary fiction gives space for creative cultural critique and the contentprovides inspiration for that critique -- even for generically spiritual, nonreligious, or …

Whimsy And Wisdom: Fairyland As A Window To Reality In The Fiction Of Chesterton And Macdonald, Jessica D. Dooley

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

A comparison of how fairyland is employed in the fiction of G.K. Chesterton and George MacDonald, and the role fairyland plays in the personal development of their fictional characters, reveals parallels and important divergences between the two writers' philosophies. Their treatments of fairyland share the context of fixed moral standards that are clearly understood by fairyland's habitants and visitors, but disclose the authors' differing definitions of the relationship between personal responsibility and consequences. Fairyland, with its mysterious, imperative rules, and glorious generosity of rewards, provides a framework for explicating with startling clarity the dangerous immediacy of the consequences of moral …

Ethics And Afterlife: The Moral Instruction Of Thomas Aquinas And C.S. Lewis, H. Dennis Fisher

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

C.S. Lewis's view of moral values and life after death flowed from both Scripture and his medieval sensibilities. This paper will compare and contrast medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas' views of ethics and the afterlife with those of C.S. Lewis. Special attention will be given to the controversial doctrine of purgatory. In today's postmodern world, ethical teaching is often relative and subjective. This paper will seek to find commonalities between Aquinas and Lewis to provide a viable basis for moral decision making in the 21st century.

"Between Two Strange Hearts": Spiritual Desolation In The Later Poetry Of Gerard Manley Hopkins & Charles Williams, Sørina Higgins, Rebecca Tirrell Talbot

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Spiritual desolation, while a perennial human experience, is expressed in historically-determined diction. Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) and Charles Williams (1886-1945) are an interesting case study, especially as Hopkins shaped Williams' later prosody. "My Own Heart" (Hopkins) shares desolation with Ignatius' Spiritual Exercises, and reading "My Own Heart" through Williams theory of spiritual "schism" as literary analysis reveals a cleft self similar to the split kingdom in "Prayers of the Pope" (Williams). Neither writer excludes hope: Hopkins' Ignatian language frames "My Own Heart" as a hopeful surrender, while Williams offers hope via occult vocabulary.

Gandalf And Merlin, Aragorn And Arthur: Tolkien's Transmogrification Of The Arthurian Tradition And Its Use As A Palimpsest For The Lord Of The Rings, Mark R. Hall

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Certainly J.R.R. Tolkien was very much aware of the Arthurian tradition that existed during the medieval period and even earlier, especially as depicted by Thomas Mallory in Le Morte d'Arthur. The affinities of the characters of Aragorn and Gandalf with Arthur and Merlin are too obvious not to notice, yet transformed in such a way by Tolkien that they are infused with new meaning and purpose. It is this transmogrification that connects Tolkien's work with the past and provides the palimpsest for the world he creates in his epic adventure depicted in The Hobbit and The Lord of the …

"Take Away The Supernatural And What Remains Is The Unnatural": Power, Secularization, And G.K. Chesterton's Villains, J. Cameron Moore

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Chesterton claims in Heretics that denial of the supernatural leads ultimately to the unnatural, and much of his work explores the consequences of suppressing or ignoring the fundamental religious dimensions of the human person. Indeed many of Chesterton's villains spurn religion altogether in their pursuit of social progress. In this paper, I examine the antagonists in The Ball and the Cross, Manalive, and The Flying Inn in light of their rejection of the supernatural.

In their attempts to recreate themselves and their societies, Chesterton's villains demonstrate a clear link between secularization, the loss of human freedom, and the deathly disfiguring …

Casting Truth In An Imaginary World: The Intertwining Of Reason And Imagination, Sharon Kotapish

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

When writing The Chronicles of Narnia, did C.S. Lewis deliberately turn from the world of reason and abandon logical argument? Or did he gravitate toward imaginative fiction because story may be the best way to communicate certain kinds of truth? Just as the Narnia tales reflect major themes in Lewis' overtly Christian nonfiction works, many of the truths taught by Jesus through parable are paralleled in the Apostle Paul's expository letters. By reading a passage from Lewis'' nonfiction writing along with a reflected passage from the Chronicles, our understanding and appreciation of both are deepened.

C.S. Lewis As Transformational Leader, Crystal Hurd

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

The term "leadership" usually evokes images of great warriors, politicians, or social figures that saturate the pages of a history textbook. However, these are pre-conceived notions of the term. Leaders are those who exercise influence, be they soldiers, politicians, or even artists such as writers and musicians. One such leader is author and apologist C.S. Lewis. Lewis spoke to his generation (and many subsequent ones) in his texts. Through Lewis, many have achieved a greater understanding of literature, spirituality, and human nature. His words have, in essence, transformed the minds of readers.

Transformational leadership is desired because it performs what …

"A Wild Hope": Resurrection Bodies And Lewis's The Last Battle, Michael P. Muth

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

In the last chapters of The Last Battle, Lewis gives his readers a vision of the heavenly Narnia, or really of ever more real Narnias embedded within one another, people by the characters that readers have come to know through all seven books of the Chronicles, described as existing in physical bodies, though possessing abilities beyond those known in the Narnia outside the stable door (or even our own world). In this paper I will explore Lewis' representation of these "resurrection bodies" and what his representation of them means for his views on the body and the integrity …

The Necessity Of The Terrible Good In The Works Of C.S. Lewis And Charles Williams, Kimberly Moore-Jumonville

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Through characters like Eustace, Psyche, and Orual, and others, Lewis reminds us that transformation from what we now are is a necessity if we wish to know God. We must relinquish the lies we blindly wear and be stripped to the bone; ironically, we have to go under the water so that we don't drown or die of thirst. Pauline, of Charles Williams's Descent into Hell, "was not yet prepared to accept the terror of good" (107), but she learns that "the Lord does things in the midst of a fire" (93). Pauline's salvation lies in relinquishing her fear to …

The Development Of J.R.R. Tolkien's Ideas On Fairy-Stories, Paul E. Michelson

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

The paper is an analysis of how Tolkien's thought on "fairy-stories" evolved between his 1939 St. Andrews Andrew Lang Lecture "Fairy Stories," through his contribution "On Fairy-Stories" to the 1947 Essays Presented to Charles Williams, and concluding with his 1967 essay on the nature of "Faërie." Time permitting, the paper will also include a discussion on how Tolkien's "Smith of Wooton Major" illustrates his concepts.

The Wise Woman As An Agent Of Identity In George Macdonald's Story The Wise Woman, Rachel Johnson

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

In this paper I investigate the Wise Woman as an agent of identity in terms of Aristotelian and modern philosophies of identity primarily drawing upon the work of Alistair McIntyre. I address the question 'how much choice does Rosamond have in the transformation process' and examine the part played by increasing self-knoweldge and personal will, given the strength of influence employed by the Wise Woman in shaping Rosamond's perception of herself.

The parallel journey of Agnes, a shepherd's daughter, is briefly mapped against Rosamond's progress in order to demonstrate choice. I conclude that Rosamond's choice is made within chosen limitations.

The Logic Of Purgatory In C.S. Lewis: Why Spiritual Formation Makes Less Sense Without It, Robert Moore-Jumonville

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Purgatory figures significantly as a theme in the writing of C.S. Lewis. The Great Divorce represents the major fictional piece treating the subject, but theological allusions and references surface in Till We Have Faces, Narnia, and other fictional works, as well as in many of the essays.

This paper presents two main points: first, Lewis's logic of purgatory. Such an argument, though not stated explicitly anywhere by Lewis, might run like this: God is holy and human beings cannot remain in God's presence (comfortably or for long) without becoming holy themselves. Lewis consistently maintained a robust theology of sanctification. Next, …

Further Responses To Lewis's 'Lost Aeneid', Richard James

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

For almost fifty years, since his death in 1963, C.S. Lewis, Lazarus-like, has continued through his literary executors to come forth from his literary grave, providing an almost unending, vast landscape of multimedia productions from multi-volume collections of personal letters and anthologies of essays to four major Hollywood film productions; from miscellaneous small action figures and early reader literacy booklets connected to the Narnian movies to highly technical on-stage renditions of the demonic Screwtape and the verbally combative, but highly successful off-Broadway drama, Freud's Last Session.

But beyond all of these highly visible projects, this paper will provide some reflections …

C.S. Lewis: An Overlooked 1963 Monograph By Roger Lancelyn Green, William O'Flaherty

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

The first full-length (and authorized) biography of Lewis was published in 1974. One of its authors was Roger Lancelyn Green. Few are aware of (or have even seen) a monograph he wrote before Lewis's death about Jack's life and writings. While Jack saw and approved of the manuscript in 1960 it wasn't released until the same year he died. The purpose of this talk is to reveal what information and insights this trusted friend presented in this rare monograph about Jack at the end of his career.

Hidden Heroes In Tolkien's Lord Of The Rings, Jan Prewitt

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Joseph Campbell in his seminal book The Hero with a Thousand Faces says in the final chapter, "The Hero Today," that unlike the classical hero, the modern hero faces a world that does not embrace a single mythology. "Then all meaning was in the group, in the great anonymous forms, none in the self-expressive individual; today no meaning is in the group -- none in the world: all is in the individual" (334). That does not mean, however, that there are no heroes in the modern world or that the modern world requires no heroic figure -- quite the contrary. …

A Meaningful Hierarchy: How C.S. Lewis Perceives Humanity's Significance, Zachary A. Rhone

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

"Humans are amphibians -- half spirit and half animal," writes Screwtape. In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis would clarify these halves as the Bios and the Zoe -- the biological and the spiritual, respectively. Humans are, as Dr. Ransom admits in That Hideous Strength, "More. But not less" than animals, yet humanity's Fall resulted from "the idea that they could 'be like gods' -- could set up on their own as if they had created themselves -- be their own masters -- invent some sort of happiness for themselves outside God, apart from God" (MC). Humans are …

Father Knows Best: The Narrator's Oral Performance As Paternal Protector In The Hobbit, Anderson Rearick Iii

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

In Tolkien lore, the narrator of The Hobbit is the only human connection to the world of Middle Earth. He is not, as some have suggested, a hobbit himself. In spite of his humanness, however, he apparently has a great amount of information about the time in the world "when there was less noise and more green." He is also a narrator with opinions. In fact it is clear that for the narrator the whole telling of The Hobbit is a teaching tool; however much adults may enjoy Bilbo's adventure, the teller is talking to children. Being a creation of …

Facts And Meanings: From Word To Myth, David Rozema

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

The 1948 Anscombe-Lewis Debate is often cited as an example of how two of England's finest minds of the twentieth century -- C.S. Lewis and Ludwig Wittgenstein -- would have debated had they ever had the chance. Anscombe was a student of Wittgenstein's, and their debate is a case in point for showing the distinction between investigating a proposition's truth and investigating its sense, its meaning. Using remarks from the works of both men, I will show that their understanding of the meaning of language -- from single words to complete stories, including myths -- is remarkably similar; and immensely …

Through The Lens Of The Four Loves: The Idea Of Love In Till We Have Faces, Paulette Sauders

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

It is my contention that when C.S. Lewis wrote his non-fiction book The Four Loves and published it in 1960, he had not been thinking about love in all of its manifestations for just a short time before it was written. All of the fictional works he wrote over the years, beginning in at least 1938, reflect his definitions and descriptions of the various kinds of love and their perversions that he systematically describes so well in The Four Loves. He does this in his fiction through his various characters and their actions.

Specifically, in Out of the Silent …

Nothing Can Come Between God And You: Uncle Tom's Cabin, George Macdonald And Shusaku Endo, Miho Yamaguchi

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe depicts the ways that God reveals Himself when evil seems triumphant and God appears to be silent. George MacDonald and Shusaku Endo apparently read this novel and deeply sympathized with its theology -- and subsequently developed its ideas and episodes in their own writings. In their views, nothing can come between God and each person; therefore, even apparent enemies can never victimize anyone -- they can only help us ultimately to be more closely united with God. They also illuminate that God never deserts people who feel weakest in faith.

Chaplain Stella Aldwinckle: A Biographical Sketch Of The Spiritual Foundation Of The Oxford University Socratic Club, Jim Stockton

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Although the Oxford University Socratic Club is most often identified with its first faculty advisor and president, C.S. Lewis, the club's inception began when several young women of Somerville College asked their newly arrived chaplain, Stella Aldwinckle, to assist them in establishing a speaker's club that would extend an open invitation to all parties who were "interested in a philosophical approach to religion . . ." The Socratic Club was an instantaneous and long-lived success, and would not have been possible without Chaplain Aldwinckle's passion, dedication, and evangelical conviction.

A Tryst With The Transcendentals: C.S. Lewis On Beauty, Truth, And Goodness Part Ii: Truth, Donald T. Williams

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

In an age of Post-Modernism and Post-Foundationalism, the very concept of truth finds itself subject to deconstruction. C.S. Lewis held to the old "correspondence theory" of truth, but did so in a way that withstands contemporary assaults better than many traditional formulations because he sought to integrate Reason and Imagination in ways not typical of earlier philosophy. Essays like "Bluspels and Flalansferes" provide a framework for understanding Lewis's statements on the nature of truth. They make possible a view of truth that is neither relativist nor reductive, but rather profoundly humane.

A Prisoner's Duty: The Sacred Role Of Reading In The Christian Life, John Stanifer

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Just how important is reading to the Christian life? Most of us are willing to assert that the Scriptures are an important part of our reading diet, but what about classic literature or popular fiction? Reading anything and everything we can get our hands on is not so far from the formula followed by some of the most influential figures in Judeo-Christian history, from C.S> Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien to Daniel and Paul the Apostle. By the end of this presentation, our goal will be to gain a closer understanding of the sacred role of all reading in the Christian …

A Speculative Meditation On Tolkien's Sources For The Character Gollum, Susan Wendling, Woody Wendling

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

In speaking of his sources for ents, Tolkien said they "are composed of philology, literature, and life." Was Gollum composed in the same way? Gollum got his start in Tolkien's writings as a creature in his poem "Glip." Gollum got his name from his "gurgling sound," the "horrible swallowing noise in his throat." From which literary sources did Tolkien arrive at the name Gollum? From the Old Norse word for gold, gollum? From the Jewish Golem (Psalm 139:16)? From the giant Goliath in the Old Testament? From Gorbo or Golithos, two characters in E.A. Wyke-Smith's book, "The Marvellous Land of …

'Few Return To The Sunlit Lands': Lewis's Classical Underworld In The Silver Chair, Benita Huffman Muth

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

As his early interest in Greek mythology and his Aeneid translation testify, classical motifs resonated with Lewis. In The Silver Chair, his characters, like Orpheus and Herakles, travel to a Greco-Roman inspired Underworld on a mission to retrieve an inhabitant. Besides lending mythic dimension to the journey, these classical echoes and Lewis' original additions create an Underworld markedly different from a popular idea of Hell. Through doing so, he underscores that this fictional place, though frightening and dangerous, is not Hell and therefore makes a theological point about the fallen condition.

By emphasizing classical references and reforming Miltonic ones (fiery …

Full Issue 2012 (Volume Viii)

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

No abstract provided.

2012 Printed Program, Taylor University

Colloquium Schedules

No abstract provided.

Feminine Leadership: Spenser's Britomart And Lewis's Reason, Jonathan Himes

Inklings Forever: Published Colloquium Proceedings 1997-2016

Scholars have debated the apparent sexism in many of Lewis's statements and in his views on female clergy. Without addressing these particular issues of importance in Lewisian studies, this paper will analyze Lewis's choice of a female virgin in the role of Reason who topples the giant Spirit of the Age in his early allegory, The Pilgrim's Regress. Besides the obvious influence of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress on this work and the feminine figures of the divine in George MacDonald's fiction as another influence, Edmund Spenser's female knight Britomart may have provided Lewis with the idea of a strong feminine …