I am reading, for the first time, Letters of C.S. Lewis edited by W.H. Lewis. This one, dated 8 February 1939 is just too delicious not to share.
You will be able to hear Tillyard and me finishing our controversy viva voce... No doubt I shall be defeated ...
I don't know if Plato did write the Phaedo: the canon of these ancient writers, under the surface, is still quite chaotic. It is also a very corrupt text. Bring it along by all means, but don't pitch your hopes too high. We are both getting so rusty that we shall make very little of it — and my distrust of all lexicons and translations is increasing. Also of Plato — and of the human mind.
I suppose for the sake of the others we must do something about arranging a walk. These maps are so unreliable by now that it is rather a farce — but still "Try, lad, try! no harm in trying". Of course hardly any districts in England are unspoiled enough to make walking worth while: and with two new members — I have very little doubt it will be a ghastly failure.
I haven't seen Charles Williams' play: it is not likely to be at all good. As for Orpheus — again, it's no harm trying. If you can't write it, console yourself by reflecting that if you did you would have been very unlikely to get a publisher. I am more and more convinced that there is no future for poetry.
Nearly everybody has been ill here: I try to prevent them all croaking and grumbling, but it is hard being the only optimist.
I'm sure Warnie edited that to make it more pronounced, but that last line had me shouting with laughter (rather scared the cat).
