by malcolmguite » January 24th, 2010, 8:46 pm
Its an interesting point about the number of books about Lewis perhaps exceeding the number he himself has written. One part of me thinks that he himself would feel deeply uncomfortable and embarrassed by this and wish instead that all these books could have been written, not about him but about the substantial things he cared about and defended; Faith, objective values, the literary tradition that runs from Homer to the end of the 19th Century. But then another part of me recognises that many of the best books ostensibly about Lewis are really about the things he cared about most, and form, for some readers, their first introduction to the earlier writers and ideas that formed Lewis's mind. Michael Ward;s excellent Planet Narnia is a case in point, its more about everything Lewis loved than it is about Lewis himself. Anyway I think the Cambridge companion will have as many signposts pointing back from Lewis to all that formed him, as it will have avenues into the man himself. It should also restore the balance in favour of Lewis as Scholar, Philosopher, and Poet to complement all the stuff on him as Apologist and Children's writer.