In honor of the birthday of considered one of the “patron saints” of latest evangelical Christianity, we thought we’d offer up ten surprising facts about Lewis to higher understand the beloved British author (and so you possibly can impress your pals at parties … at any time when we are able to have those again).
If you simply know C. S. Lewis due to his books about Narnia, then you definitely don’t know Jack thoroughly! “Jack,” is, in fact, the name Lewis went by to his friends. This is just considered one of the numerous interesting details about him that usually are not commonly known. Another is the actual fact he died on November 22, 1963—the identical day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Here are ten more tidbits about Lewis that some might find unusual, and even misunderstand.
1. Famous before Narnia
While Lewis is most known for writing The Chronicles of Narnia, he was famous enough to be on the duvet of Time magazine three years before the primary tale related to Aslan was published. In 1947, Lewis was the featured story for the September 8 issue of Time. The article on Lewis got here out a couple of months after his latest book, Miracles: A Preliminary Study, was released. The reason for this honor was attributable to his popularity from his fictionalized correspondence between two demons in The Screwtape Letters. An informal take a look at the duvet reveals this, as you see a pitchforked devil on his left shoulder and the wing of an angel over his head.
2. Married the identical woman twice
Most are aware Lewis married Joy Davidman Gresham, but did you realize he tied the knot along with her twice? The first time was on April 23, 1956, in a civil ceremony. He did it as a friendly gesture to stop Joy from deportation from England (she was an American). Less than a 12 months later, when it was thought she would soon die from cancer, he married her again at Churchill Hospital on March 21, 1957. So, why do it again? Few actually knew in regards to the first wedding, so it was partially because he desired to declare his love for her before others. This a part of Lewis’s life was the topic of the movie Shadowlands that was first produced by BBC in 1985 and later a Hollywood movie in 1993.
3. Cared for a girl married to a different man
Admittedly this headline is a bit sensationalized, but it surely’s true! As a young man, Lewis made a vow to his friend, Paddy Moore, to take care of Moore’s mother if he died. When Paddy was killed in World War I, Lewis made good on his promise and lived with Janie King Moore until just before she died. Moore, though separated from her husband, never divorced; nonetheless, it will not be as scandalous as you may think. Moore’s daughter, Maureen (the long run Lady Dunbar of Hempriggs), lived with them for several of those years. Also, Jack’s brother Warren lived in the identical household with them for about two-thirds of the time they lived together. While some would have you suspect there needed to be a sexual relationship, as Lewis scholar Jerry Root has stated, it is basically as much as the those that make this claim to prove it.
4. Soldier in WWI and wounded in motion
Speaking of WWI, Lewis voluntarily enlisted within the British army in 1917. The above-mentioned Paddy Moore was Lewis’s roommate at Keble College, Oxford, where they each received cadet training. They had met shortly after Lewis joined the Oxford University Officers’ Training Corps on April 30, 1917. On November 17 that 12 months, he went to France as a part of his service. He rarely said much about his life as a soldier, and so few of his experiences are known. We do know that he was hospitalized with pyrexia in February 1918, and two months later he was wounded on Mont-Bernanchon (near Lillers, France) throughout the Battle of Arras.
5. Wanted to be a poet
It’s no secret Lewis enjoyed writing, but his original passion was poetry. In 1919, before his twenty first birthday, his first book, Spirits in Bondage: A Cycle of Lyrics, was published. Nearly all the book was written when he was 16 or 17 years old. During that point, Lewis didn’t consider in God, and the fabric reflects that perspective. The book didn’t sell many copies. His next poetry book, Dymer, got here out in 1926 and in addition didn’t sell well. While he never published a recent book of poems during his lifetime, he did proceed to put in writing them and quite a couple of were released in quite a lot of publications during his lifetime. There were so lots of them that lower than a 12 months after his death, Walter Hooper edited a set simply called Poems.
6. Wrote three books under different names
Can you imagine Lewis not taking credit for books he wrote? While it might be difficult to think about, it’s true. Early in his profession, his first two books of poetry, Spirits in Bondage and Dymer, were each credited to Clive Hamilton (Clive is his actual first name and Hamilton is his mother’s maiden name). Then, before he died, A Grief Observed was published (in 1961) under the pseudonym N. W. Clerk. That book recounts among the sorrow Lewis experienced after the death of his wife. It was republished the 12 months after his own death with him identified because the writer.
7. Taught philosophy before English
While some are aware Lewis’s first full-time job was teaching English literature at Oxford University, far fewer know he had a short lived position (1924–25) as teacher of philosophy at Oxford. One of his degrees from Oxford was Literae Humaniores, which involves the study of classics, philosophy, and ancient history, which qualified him for the short-term post. In fact, he even applied for a philosophy position at Trinity College, Oxford (but did not get it). The short-term position he did secure at University College, Oxford, was to show throughout the absence of Edgar Frederick Carritt (who was Lewis’s tutor in philosophy). Carritt was on leave to show on the University of Ann Arbor, Michigan.
8. Never was a professor at Oxford
As noted already, Lewis did teach at Oxford. While he taught there for 30 years, he was never given the title of Professor. Instead, he was merely a “don.” What’s the difference? A don within the UK is one who’s a “tutor” or “lecturer” of a selected subject. A professor is usually the pinnacle of a department and has a more flexible schedule. Less than ten years before his death, Lewis accepted a professorship of medieval and Renaissance English at Cambridge University.
9. Tolkien was instrumental in Lewis getting Cambridge position
Lewis was appointed to his professorship at Cambridge on October 1, 1954 (he officially began it on January 1, 1955). Ironically, regardless that the position was created for him, Lewis initially showed little or no interest in it. His friends J. R. R. Tolkien, E. M. W. Tillyard, F. P. Wilson, and Basil Willey all played a task in Lewis getting the position, but Tolkien deserves special mention. As Alister McGrath recounts in C. S. Lewis: A Life: Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet, after Lewis had twice declined the offer to show at Cambridge, Tolkien wouldn’t let the matter go. He sought clarification from Lewis about why he refused the offer. Lewis thought he would must move from his home of over twenty years and live in Cambridge. This was not so, and because of not one but two letters written by Tolkien, the difficulty was settled. Or, at the least everyone thought it was; unfortunately, Cambridge offered the position to their second alternative before Lewis contacted the university. Fortunately, that person declined, and Lewis took the position when it was offered to him a 3rd time.
10. Lewis’s encouragement helped get the Lord of the Rings published
Why was Tolkien so willing to assist Lewis obtain the position at Cambridge? As you will have heard, they were friends from Lewis’s early days at Oxford. But did you realize they were so close that Lewis actually read a version of The Hobbit about five years before it was published? He told his friend Arthur Greeves about it in a letter from 1933: “Since term began I even have had a pleasant time reading a children’s story which Tolkien has just written.” Not long after the book got here out in 1937, Tolkien’s publisher wanted a sequel. As Diana Glyer recounts in Bandersnatch, Tolkien initially declined but eventually reconsidered. Early chapters of the sequel were shown to Lewis on March 4, 1938. Lewis gave feedback to Tolkien that he took to heart, which led to the rewriting of the primary three chapters. As you may recall, The Lord of the Ringswas not published until the Nineteen Fifties, but few know that, had it not been for Lewis, it’d never have seen the sunshine of day. Tolkien wrote in his letters about Lewis, “I owe to his encouragement the proven fact that … I persevered and eventually finished The Lord of the Rings.”
William O’Flaherty is an in-home family therapist, writer, and creator of the web site essentialcslewis.com and the YouTube channel 90 Seconds to Knowing C.S. Lewis. His latest book is The Misquotable C. S. Lewis: What He Didn’t Say, What He Actually Said, and Why It Matters (Wipf and Stock, 2018).
