A Pilgrim in Narnia

If you are not in North America, you may not know that there are some border tensions between the USA and its closest cultural cousin, Canada. Before last week, apparently, the wildfires that devastated our forests and consumed our towns have irresponsibly sent clouds of smoke to the south, without a permit. In the early ’80s, LA was the 4th largest Canadian city, and even still we play in your films and add our own jazz hands twist to your arts scene. And yet, a trade war. Even as our oil, potatoes, and scientists find their way into American cars, French fries, and research institutes, it seems that we Canadians have been unfair in our trading practices. It sounds odd, I know, but when it comes to kitchen tables and corners stores, the war is real.

Even for us here on the ground, it is a bit hard to believe. Camping this summer, I had Bostonians to the right of me and Texans to the left of me, and still all seemed okay. Accents differed, and tastes in music, but in each campsite the sparks went up to meet the arboreal atmosphere in much the same way. It is difficult to feel at war when tossing a soggy ball across the swimming pool while wearing bathing shorts. Our international brotherhood, it seems, was somewhat illicit. They apologized for all the things on the news, and I apologized for everything else (being Canadian). And then we seemed okay.

Somewhere in the midst, of all of this, my book has been lost. The Spiritual Imagination of C.S. Lewis, as an Oxford University Press book is, naturally, printed in the United States. Since our Aug 11th launch date, it has been available to Americans–and the Kindle is still on sale for $13.19 USD, and the list price is $35 USD (I have a 30% off promo code for the UK and US, so send me an email). In the US, my Kindle is still a “Top New Release” for 20th-century Literary Criticism–a category just ahead of the list on Tegestology through the Ages in popularity, but still kind of neat.

The book even has its first review!

Thanks to the clearly adept, intelligent, and book-chic “Sky-blue,” whoever you are–and kudos to your parents for giving you such a creative name.

Friends have sent me their box opening images and notes from upstate New York, Indianapolis, Indiana, Houston, Texas, Cambridge, Mass., London, England, and Iași, Poland. The word is out in the US and around the world.

But what about Flin Flon, Manitoba, Dildo, Newfoundland, Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, Alberta, Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha!, Québec, or our own Crapaud, PEI?

In Canada, my home and native land, only the Kindle and Kobo have been available. It’s a puzzle–though academic libraries can access any chapter or the whole book (just ask). It was good fun in August to share my experience of unpacking my new book, The Spiritual Imagination of C.S. Lewis in a front-porch Instagram/Facebook video, but we still can’t get copies at our local bookstores.

Now, I’m not saying that my book has become a major pawn in the battle between the power brokers from the President’s White House and the advisors that gather at the Prime Minister’s favourite booth at Tim Hortons. I’m sure it is a coincidence….

In the meantime, though, I have good news! Books are starting to arrive at Canadian warehouses. I got an encouraging email today from New York that The Spiritual Imagination of C.S. Lewis is on the move. They will re-push the print copy to Amazon and Indigo, and, the Charlottetown Bookmark has been unwavering in its listing at $38.50 (which is less than Amazon). Another thanks to local booksellers–always check there first.

My next post will have news of a couple of local book launch events. I’ll be at the Undiscovered C.S. Lewis conference near Portland, OR Sep 23-27 as well.

Thanks, everyone, for hanging in there and sending the encouraging tweets, pics, and reviews.

What’s It All About?

With book sales exceeding 200 million copies, a billion-dollar film industry, and a bookshelf of critical, philosophical, and popular works, C.S. Lewis is at once the beloved author of The Chronicles of Narnia and a leading twentieth-century English-speaking Christian public intellectual. Given the sheer diversity of Lewis’s writing, what holds all this together? What is the beating heart of Lewis’ work?

Among C.S. Lewis scholars, there is near-unanimous agreement with British philosopher Owen Barfield’s claim that, “what Lewis thought about everything was secretly present in what he said about anything.” In The Spiritual Imagination of C.S. Lewis, Brenton D. G. Dickieson argues that what Lewis reveals throughout his writings is a cross-shaped, or cruciform, spirituality. As an instinctive and integrative writer of spiritual theology, Lewis believed that “death is at the root of the whole matter”—that God’s self-surrender in Christ through death on a cross and subsequent resurrection is the normative pattern for a healthy spiritual life. This death-and-resurrection pattern unites Lewis’s Christian thought and produces a hopeful and evocative spirituality that is embedded in his poetry and prose.

By reconsidering him as a spiritual theologian, Dickieson uncovers a six-point “Logic of Cruciformity” in Lewis’s apologetics that is embedded in narrative form throughout his other works. The shape of the cross is the shape of Lewis’s spiritual theology. With the “upsidedownedness” of childlike wonder, Lewis reveals what Dickieson calls a “Theology of the Small,” filled with “sacred paradoxes” and offering a hopeful, transformative invitation to spiritual life.

It was good fun last week to share my experience of unpacking my new book, The Spiritual Imagination of C.S. Lewis. The front-porch video got a few thousand spins on social media and hundreds of comments from friends. It was a nice moment to share with my family on the eve of Launch Day (Tuesday, Aug 11th).

Launch Day arrive in the United States of America without a hitch, I believe. Folks have been able to order The Spiritual Imagination wherever shiny books are sold, and I was able to purchase and post a pair of paper copies for the Marion E. Wade Centre, where so much of my earliest research took place. The Kindle is still 40% off in the US ($13.19), and it is still a “Top New Release” for 20th-century Literary Criticism–a category just ahead of Yak Husbandry in popularity, but still kind of neat. It even has its first review:

Thanks to the clearly adept, intelligent, and book-chic “Sky-blue,” whoever you are–and kudos to your parents for giving you such a creative name.

All systems in the countdown to launch in Chicago, New York, Fargo, and Houston are “go and nominal.” We have takeoff and everything is well in the United States–a relatively rare news heading item these days.

But what about Vancouver, Montreal, Iqaluit, and Cavendish? How did Launch Day go in Canada?

Here, it seems, in brave Canada with its wind-swept buffalo, last-hope sports teams, and secretive ketchup chips–well, here, we have had a failure to launch. We haven’t even walked out to the launchpad in slow motion yet.

It’s a problem I noted a few weeks ago, but one that hasn’t been fixed yet. Even today, nearly a week after it was launched, Amazon is out of stock of my book and still doesn’t have a listing priced. It’s selling well above list price ($38.50 in Canada) because it’s shipping from the US. And although the Kindle/Kobo lanuch went well, my book on Indigo.ca is authorless; on Amazon.ca, I’m listed as “University 1000 Coordinator and Bis Coordinator Assistant Professor Brenton D G Dickieson.” Clearly, my parents were not as clever in naming children as the primogenitors of our friend, the supremely skillful savant, Sky-blue.

It’s a metadata processing error, I am told. Usually, this isn’t a problem for me. I even got a compliment from an indie music producer about how good I am at metadata management. I think my parents were even considering “Metadata” as my middle name, but they went with “Bis Coordinator” instead.

This issue, however, is beyond me. I’ve talked to OUP (they are working on it), and tried to get my account approved by Amazon (still no word there). An author/publisher friend told me that my problem is I’m talking to a well-paid professional in charge of things when I should be talking to someone who has “Metadata” as a middle name and makes a dollar above minimum wage. Perhaps she is right.

So … what next?

I’m trying to look on the positive side of things. When I find out that my Lewis book is out here in the land of mighty beavers, hand-made toques, and 80% of our population amassed along the US border, I will get to have a second launch! In fact, there’s more to come. On the same hour last Thursday, I booked an on-campus launch with my local bookstore and a library event. I’ll share about that a bit later.

But we need the book on shelves. How can we have a book launch party without any books? It’s pretty essential.

Meanwhile, dear Canadians, the Kindle is on sale at Amazon for $21.99 CDN, and Indigo has the Kobo priced ato $17.39 CDN. Ensure your library has a copy (more on that here).

What’s It All About?

With book sales exceeding 200 million copies, a billion-dollar film industry, and a bookshelf of critical, philosophical, and popular works, C.S. Lewis is at once the beloved author of The Chronicles of Narnia and a leading twentieth-century English-speaking Christian public intellectual. Given the sheer diversity of Lewis’s writing, what holds all this together? What is the beating heart of Lewis’ work?

Among C.S. Lewis scholars, there is near-unanimous agreement with British philosopher Owen Barfield’s claim that, “what Lewis thought about everything was secretly present in what he said about anything.” In The Spiritual Imagination of C.S. Lewis, Brenton D. G. Dickieson argues that what Lewis reveals throughout his writings is a cross-shaped, or cruciform, spirituality. As an instinctive and integrative writer of spiritual theology, Lewis believed that “death is at the root of the whole matter”—that God’s self-surrender in Christ through death on a cross and subsequent resurrection is the normative pattern for a healthy spiritual life. This death-and-resurrection pattern unites Lewis’s Christian thought and produces a hopeful and evocative spirituality that is embedded in his poetry and prose.

By reconsidering him as a spiritual theologian, Dickieson uncovers a six-point “Logic of Cruciformity” in Lewis’s apologetics that is embedded in narrative form throughout his other works. The shape of the cross is the shape of Lewis’s spiritual theology. With the “upsidedownedness” of childlike wonder, Lewis reveals what Dickieson calls a “Theology of the Small,” filled with “sacred paradoxes” and offering a hopeful, transformative invitation to spiritual life.