Classic Remarks: Is Susan’s fate in C.S. Lewis “The Last Battle” sexist?

Lewis’ message is that we should all look at Susan, see ourselves, and shuddering turn from folly to wisdom.

Merry Christmas from the World of Literature

King Arthur lay, at Camelot upon a Christmas-tide, with many a gallant lord and lovely lady, and all the noble brotherhood of the Round Table. There they held rich revels with gay talk and jest; one while they would ride forth to joust and tourney, and again back to the court to make carols; for

Book Meme 2012 Week 3: Magnificent Villainy

Topic: Which literary villain is the best?  Even acknowledging the great diversity of ways a villain can be a good character, and the difficulty of finding a paragon of one such Way that can be judged higher than those of other Ways, the shortlist for this topic was easy to compile. The reason is simple:

On Myth: “An Experience in Criticism” by C.S. Lewis, Chapter 5

Unfortunately, this will be my last post in Lewis’ book, at least for the time being. Why? The book is due back to the library tomorrow and I’ve already renewed it twice. But weep not, my friends! For this is one of the more important chapters for understanding what people like Lewis, Tolkien, and MacDonald

Unliterary Readers: “An Experiment in Criticism” by C.S. Lewis, Chapter 4

Chapter 4 The Reading of the Unliterary Each art is itself and not some other art. Words mean things in a way that musical notes do not. So while the best appreciation of a symphony may be to attend to the intricacy of the notes themselves, even apart from the subjective meanings they suggest to

The Few and the Many: “An Experiment in Criticism” by C.S. Lewis, Chapter 3

The first demand any work of any art makes upon us is surrender.  Chapter 3 How the Few and the Many Use Pictures and Music By way of expanding the uses of his theory, and of providing more varied examples, Lewis begins noting how the “many” tend to approach visual arts and music in a

“False Characterizations”: “An Experiment in Criticism” by C.S. Lewis, Chapter 2

Chapter 2 False Characterizations Having used the terms “the many” and “the few” to refer to the two broad groups of readers – those who use books for some purpose and those who receive each book for what it is – Lewis immediately points out the many false connotations the terms may have. We must

“An Experiment in Criticism” by C.S. Lewis, Chapter 1

At the persistent recommendations of some trusted friends, I have finally set my hands upon C.S. Lewis’ An Experiment in Criticism. Two and a half days has got me over half way through – the book is a quicker read than I expected, due in part to Lewis’ customary conciseness and in other part to

Book Blogger Hop, and Further Recommendations

Blogger Jen at Crazy for Books has a neat idea called the Book Blogger Hop that is geared towards connecting bloggers with similar literary tastes. Basically, her post hosts a list of all participating bloggers, with links to their sites. The catch is that you only get your link posted if you too post about

Book Review: “Lilith” by George MacDonald

An entrancing and utterly unique, unpredictable story, full of the beauty, the gravitas, and possibly the underlying reality of dreams.Rarely has the fantasy genre been so amazingly used to communicate the gospel.