FACT OF THE DAY:
The lighthearted essay “A Dream” was first published on this date (7/28) in 1944 in The Spectator. It’s available in Present Concerns.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“In my waking hours I would never [approve some actions]. But the dreaming mind is regrettably immoral.”
A Dream
(Published in The Spectator on 7/28/1945)
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QUIZ OF THE DAY:
Which of the Narnia books did Lewis NOT dedicated to anyone?
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(Click “Read More” to SEE Answer)
Highlights for the period of July 22-31include: Lewis on the radio that wasn’t a part of the eventual Mere Christianity book, the U.S. release of The Four Loves and the publication of a friend’s landmark book that Lewis encouraged the author to write (hint: it has a “ring” to it).
When you consider a person’s life over the years (like this series has with C.S. Lewis), it’s no surprise that there might be a week or two were relatively little significant events happened. Such is the case for this time-period. However, there was a very meaningful moment in the life of a now more famous friend, J.R.R. Tolkien. In 1954 The Fellowship of the Ring was published at the end of July (the actual date is either the 24th or 29th, as I’ve seen both listed).
It’s not just because they were friends that it’s worth mentioning, rather
Highlights for the final third of June (22nd – 30th) include: Sharing The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe with his close friends four months before it was published, being awarded an honorary Doctorate of Divinity and more talk from Screwtape about the “law of Undulation.”
As you may recall, Lewis met frequently with a group of friends called the Inklings. They gathered at a variety of places, but on the 22nd in 1950 it happened to be at the Eagle and Child. When they came together at this location it was unusual for them to actually read any of their works. Nevertheless, this was a special occasion, as Lewis brought the galley proofs of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
FACT OF THE DAY:
An expanded version of “Bulverism” by Lewis was printed in the June, 1944 issue of The Socratic Digest.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“…Good images of what we really desire…the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.”
The Weight of Glory
(Sermon preached on 6/8/1941)
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QUIZ OF THE DAY:
What animals helped to freed Aslan in The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe?
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(Click “Read More” to SEE Answer)
FACT OF THE DAY:
Today (5/31) in 1951 Lewis was having dinner with Roger Lancelyn Green and it was on this occasion that he asked him to be his biographer.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“I take our emotional life to be ‘higher’ than the life of our sensations – not, of course, morally higher, but richer, more varied, more subtle.
Transposition
(Sermon preached on 5/28/1944)
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QUIZ OF THE DAY:
What talk did Lewis give this month at the Oxford Socratic Club that had a question mark in the title?
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(Click “Read More” to SEE Answer)
FACT OF THE DAY:
Transposition is a sermon Lewis preached on 5/28/1944 at the chapel of Mansfield College. The text is in The Weight of Glory.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“[God] made His own plan or plot of history such that it admits a certain amount of free play and can be modified in response to our prayers.”
Work and Prayer
(Published in The Coventry Evening Telegraph on 5/28/1945)
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QUIZ OF THE DAY:
Which Narnia book is the following passage from and who said it:
“I believe that was the sort of thing I was thinking of…But….I’ve an idea that all those circles and things are rather rot. I don’t think he’d like them. It would look as if we thought we could make him do things. But really, we can only ask him.”
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(Click “Read More” to SEE Answer)
Highlights for the final third of May (22nd – 31st) include: A prize-winning essay, his first Christian book that was his only true allegory and a Pentecost sermon.
Lewis’s first book after becoming a Christian was very different in several ways than his two previous works. Those initial titles were poetry, while The Pilgrim’s Regress: An Allegorical Apology for Christianity, Reason and Romanticism, publishedon the 25th in 1933 was his debut prose effort. Additionally, the story was pure allegory. Interestingly, it was such a difficult read that Lewis himself even admitted it and ten years after its release he wrote a preface to explain his approach to the story.
FACT OF THE DAY:
Lewis gave a talk today (4/30) in 1953 at the Socratic Club on “Faith and Evidence.” It was later published as “On Obstinacy in Belief.”
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QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“The demand for equality has two sources; one of them is among the noblest, the other is the basest, of human emotions. The noble source is the desire for fair play. But the other source is the hatred of superiority.”
Democratic Education
(First published in the Notes on the Way column on 4/29/1944 in Time and Tide)
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QUIZ OF THE DAY:
Complete the quote and name the source (3 words):
“Those who do not think about their own sins make up for it _____ _____ _____ about the sins of others.”
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(Click “Read More” to SEE Answer)
FACT OF THE DAY:
There are characters named in Narnia for every letter in the alphabet except for “x.”
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QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“The more a man was in the Devil’s power, the less he would be aware of it, on the principle that a man is still fairly sober as long as he knows he’s drunk.”
Answers to Questions on Christianity
(Talk given on April 18th or 19th in 1944 at the Electric and Musical Industries Christian Fellowship)
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QUIZ OF THE DAY:
What is the name of the talk that Lewis gave in the early fifties before all the Narnia stories were published where he spoke of different ways of writing for children?
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(Click “Read More” to SEE Answer)
Highlights for the final third of April (20th – 30th) include: Publication of Perelandra, a talk “On Three Ways of Writing for Children” and Lewis’s first marriage to Joy Davidman.
Before Lewis gain fame from a series of books about a place called Narnia, he had written a trilogy that had a science fiction theme. The second of those books, Perelandra, came out on the 20th in 1943. In it we take a trip to Venus with the main character, Ransom and follow his quest to save that world from impending corruption. In the U.S. it wasn’t released until a year later on the 11th. In 1953 a paperback version came out under the title Voyage to Venus. On some occasions in his life Lewis considered this novel to be his best (this was also said of Till We Have Faces). Perelandra was dedicated “To Some Ladies at Wantage,” as in Wantage,
