Prince Caspian Trailer
CS LEWIS... WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast Ireland on November 29. 1898 He had an older brother named Warnie who was 3 years older.
At a young age he developed a love for books and story telling; which fueled his imagination spurring him to create make believe worlds. Lewis had a passion for "dressed animals" as a boy, falling in love with Beatrix Potter's stories and often writing and illustrating his own animal stories. He and his brother, Warnie, together created the world of Boxen, which was inhabited and run by animals. Lewis loved to read, and as his fathers house was filled with books, he felt that finding a book he had not read was as easy as finding a blade of grass.
At the age of 9 in 1908, his life took a turn for the worst when his mother Flora died of cancer. Shortly after he was sent away to boarding school with his brother Warnie. It was a difficult time for both boys. Looking back now, it was no surprise that this was a tumultuous time for Warnie and Jack. This school, the Wynyard School in Watford, had a headmaster that was quite literally insane. The school was forever closed when the headmaster was committed to a psyshiatric institution.
It was in 1913, that he abandoned his childhood Christian faith.
His next school was a vast improvement to the boarding school; it was here that he became intrigued by poetry, and continued to cultivate his love of books and mythology.
In 1916 Lewis accepted a scholarship to the prestigious University College at Oxford during World War I. The following year his studies were interrupted when he volunteered to serve in the British Army to fight in WWI. He was commissioned as an officer in the third Battalion, Somerset Light Infantry. After months of fighting in the trenches and being wounded in the first World War he returned to Oxford as an even more devoted student.
In 1919 Jack released his first book, a collection of poems, but it wasnt until the unveiling of his 1941 book The Screwtape Letters that he began to gain world renown.
Since abandoning his Christian faith in 1913 Lewis had become an atheist. It wasnt until now, some time later that he wrote an account of his eyes being opened to the truth of Christianity, under the title Surprised by Joy.
Influenced by arguments with his Oxford colleague and Roman Catholic friend J. R. R. Tolkien, and by G.K. Chesterton's book, The Everlasting Man, he slowly rediscovered Christianity.
In 1929, he came to believe in the existence of God, later writing:
"In 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed," describing himself as "the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England."
In 1931, after a lengthy discussion with Tolkien and another close friend, Hugo Dyson, he reconverted to Christianity and (to the regret of Tolkien) joined the Church of England. He noted, "I came into Christianity kicking and screaming."
Jack said he was inspired to write the The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe when he had an image of a faun carrying packages in a snowy wood and saw an image of a queen in a sledge. He remarked that he felt he needed only to fill in the missing pieces.
This story, one informed by his faith, and inspired by mythology and imagination has become a classic and the bar to which all childrens works are now judged. Jack never intended on writing the remainder of The Chronicles but the public demanded it. Early on, he had many critics but this child book fantasy, pointing men to the True Aslan, the man of Jesus Christ, went on to sell over 100 million copies worldwide.
He spent much of his time after writing the Narnia series caring for his wife Joy who had been diagnosed with cancer. In 1960 his wife died and three years later Jack joined her.
Jack may be gone but his works, his stories, and his spirit continue to live, to laugh, and to love all those that enter into the enchanted world of the great Oxford don.
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This is the pub where the writers group "The Inklings" met every week, noteable authors in the group were Lewis and his good friend JRR Tolkien who wrote The Lord of the Rings. Follow the link to learn more.
