I’m pleased to announce that I will be giving a talk at the Oxford C.S. Lewis Society next week (Tues, Oct 23rd, 8pm for 8.15pm start at Pusey House). The Society was very kind to fit me in on my short UK trip and allow me to talk about my research. I am talking about the word images in C.S. Lewis’ work and how they relate to spiritual life. To get a sense of what I’m talking about you can read my guest blog at Theological Miscellany or my post on the Spiritual Legacy of C.S. Lewis’ Work. I am quite excited and a bit nervous to test my ideas in the crucible of readers of Lewis so close to his home.

If you are coming to the talk and want to prep by reading something of Lewis’, pick up The Problem of Pain, Mere Christianity, The Pilgrim’s Regress, The Great Divorce, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, or Till We Have Faces–whatever one you feel like reading. But as you read ask yourself the question: In what ways is Lewis trying to shape the way I live my spiritual life?

Whether Oxford-bound or stuck at home, I will leave you where I will begin on Tuesday. This is the fifth canto of Dymer, a poem of some beauty but more than just a little difficult to discern in meaning. I am going to start my talk with this scene, with Dymer (hero? villain? dupe of fate?) as he sits in the bracing cold of the mountaintop. I hope, at the very least, it will encourage you to look at the poem again.

Dymer, Canto V

21

Meanwhile the furrowed fog rolled down ahead,
Long tatters of its vanguard smearing round
The bases of the crags. Like cobweb shed
Down the deep combes it dulled the tinkling sound
Of water on the hills. The spongy ground
Faded three yards ahead: then nearer yet
Fell the cold wreaths, the white depth gleaming wet.

22

Then after a long time the path he trod
Led downward. Then all suddenly it dipped
Far steeper, and yet steeper, with smooth sod.
He was half running now. A stone that slipped
Beneath him, rattled headlong down: he tripped,
Stumbled and clutched—then panic, and no hope
To stop himself, once lost upon that slope.

23

And faster, ever faster, and his eye
Caught tree-tops far below. The nightmare feeling
Had gripped him. He was screaming: and the sky
Seemed hanging upside down. Then struggling, reeling,
With effort beyond thought he hung half kneeling,
Halted one saving moment. With wild will
He clawed into the hillside and lay still,

24

Half hanging on both arms. His idle feet
Dangled and found no hold. The moor lay wet
Against him and he sweated with the heat
Of terror, all alive. His teeth were set.
“By God, I will not die,” said he. “Not yet.”
Then slowly, slowly, with enormous strain,
He heaved himself an inch: then heaved again,

25

Till saved and spent he lay. He felt indeed
It was the big, round world beneath his breast,
The mother planet proven at his need.
The shame of glad surrender stood confessed,
He cared not for his boasts. This, this was best,
This giving up of all. He need not strive;
He panted, he lay still, he was alive.