Hi all
One day a few weeks after the Perelandra conference and opera in Oxford last June, I woke up one morning with an idea about a sequel to That hideous Strength (THS), with Mark and Jane Studdock's grandson becoming Pendragon and facing new challenges, or rather old challenges renewed, in the 21st century. I started sketching out some notes and soon realised that this was probably not a good idea, discussions about CSL 'fan lit' and CSLs suggestion to child fans that if they wanted more Narnia stories they should try writing some themselves notwithstanding. So ideas about an entirely new novel (if there is any such thing) exploring some CSL-identified themes in a different style for a different time, began to swirl round and infest my mind. Inspiration rather than plagiarism.
Anyhow, one of the big themes in THS (and there are several themes in this novel, which is SO much richer and deeper than generally credited) is old evil meeting up and combining with new evil to give us 1 +1=5 or more, the sum being worse than the parts, producing a godless tyranny whcih chews up everything in its path, and all in the name of.....whatever we fools currently worship instead of Maleldil.
I have been sketching out a future Britain, circa 2090, which is post-industrial, post-Christian, decimated population and an all powerful state religion run by scientist-druids who appeal to a sort of intelligent design evolution origin belief system which had brought back the old Roman, Norse, Greek and other pagan gods and blended them with the worst aspects of 20th century secular humanism.
Any reflections, suggestions, imprecations, desolations on this train of thought?