Are we allowed to give books by C.S. Lewis less than five stars? I feel a little guilty saying that this one is worth three, maybe four, but to be honest I think most, if not all, of these were published posthumously, which means Lewis himself didn’t insist on their publication. Well, maybe it means that. Maybe he would agree with me!
The hardest part of the reading for me was near the end, where there are chapters from an unfinished book concerning the Trojan Horse, Helen of Troy, and all that. It was engaging and interesting…and very frustrating to me that there was no conclusion. The saving grace for that was Roger Lancelyn Green’s afterward in which he explains the possible directions Lewis might have gone, had not his ability to “see pictures” {which was how all his fiction was given birth, it seems} degenerated.
What I loved most about this was getting a glimpse of what the writing process might have been like for Lewis, at least in regard to Story.
I copied out some quotes from his unfinished essay {or letter to the editor, perhaps?} titled A Reply to Professor Haldane that I thought might be less well known:
Detestation for any ethic which worships success is one of my chief reasons for disagreeing with most communists.
Every tyrant must begin by claiming to have what his victims respect and to give what they want.
{This next one is my favorite.}
The worst of all public dangers is the committee of public safety.
I must, of course, admit that the actual state of affairs may sometimes be so bad that a man is tempted to risk change even by revolutionary methods; to say that desperate diseases require desperate remedies and that necessity knows no law. But to yield to this temptation is, I think, fatal. It is under that pretext that every abomination enters. Hitler, the Machiavellian Prince, the Inquisition, the Witch Doctor, all claimed to be necessary.
Most of his best lines on writing stories, or on the value of fantasy, are already very well known, so I will not bother to type them out.
So is this worth reading? Absolutely, especially if you are a Lewis fan {which I am}. Just don’t expect something written to perfection, because these are unfinished works, for the most part. In fact, in writing this review, I talked myself into giving it four stars and calling it “excellent” because…well, because despite my frustrations, Lewis almost always is excellent.
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