For those interested delving past the Narnia world, I invite you to read C.S. Lewis’ “spiritual autobiography,” Surprised By Joy: The Shape of My Early Life, where the author discusses the Christianity of his early youth, his later denouncing of such (leading him to atheism), and then to his eventual full circle back to Christianity. All the while, Lewis is discussing his search for joy and what that really means.
Readers should know one does not need to subscribe to the beliefs of Christianity, or any religion for that matter, to appreciate this work. Ultimately, this book philosophically examines the idea of joy and what it is exactly, and for some, like Lewis, this joy was coupled with his belief in Christianity.
The book begins literally with his birth in the chapter, “The First Years,” where Lewis begins the tale. “I was born in the winter of 1898 at Belfast, the son of a solicitor and of a clergyman’s daughter.” Here, Lewis describes God as not a savior nor a judge, but a magician.
Much of the joy in his early years dissolved due to his mother’s death, which he addresses right away in the first chapter. He also notes his “boorish inaptitude for formality,” yet one might find it ironic that this same person would later embrace religion, a separate formality unto itself.
When Lewis speaks about his mother’s funeral, he states, “To my hatred for what I already felt to be all the fuss and flummery of the funeral I may perhaps trace something in me which I now recognize as a defect but which I have never fully overcome—a distaste for all that is public, all that belongs to the collective; a boorish inaptitude for formality.”
Later he speaks about his times at boarding school, feeling lonely, and how children would “grow up strangers to their next door neighbors.” One can get a sense of why the young C.S. Lewis found comfort in books and stories. Perhaps that love of literature is what also fascinated him with the Bible and all the tales within.
If fans of the Narnia series are looking for little hints into The Lion, Witch and The Wardrobe, perhaps one can go no further: “In some ways Mountbracken was like our father’s house. There too we found the attics, the indoor silences, the endless bookshelves.” The idea of the young boy being lost in a maze of bookshelves and imagination certainly can whet one’s interest for future fantasies, and that seems to be just what it did.
Article comments
1 - Luke
A thoughtful review. Thanks so much. I'm a fan of Mere Christianity for its straightforward presentation of Lewis' faith, and it seems Surprised by Joy may be just as good.