Veteran AF: C.S.Lewis: A Very Short Introduction by James Como, Book 41 of 2022

Saturday, November 26, 2022

C.S.Lewis: A Very Short Introduction by James Como, Book 41 of 2022

Sometimes I have a book for a few years, suddenly remember I have it, and read it in a couple of days. That just happened with C.S. Lewis: A Very Short Introduction by Jim Como. I have had the copy since it was first published in 2019. I bought it and had it signed by the author at the 50th Anniversary of the New York C.S. Lewis Society.

Jim is one of the founding members. I joined a decade after the founding of the group in 1979 just after I left active duty in the Army in Germany. Jim and I have known each other for four decades. I attended meetings of the NY CSL Society about once a year for the past four decades. Like most NYCSL members, Jim lives and works in the New York City region.

I read the book now because I just finished reading CSL's longest book: English Literature in the Sixteenth Century excluding drama. Lewis referred to it by the series name abbreviation OHEL: Oxford History of English Literature.

I read Jim's book to as a review of all that Lewis wrote before and after the OHEL.

The short introduction includes a brief biography, brief summaries and evaluations of all of Lewis's books and many essays. He even includes a list of the more prominent critics of Lewis and some of the controversies that cropped up during and after Lewis's life.

After being so far into the weeds of the 16th Century, it was fun to come back to all the ways Lewis wrote and lived. I have read all of the 40 books published in during the life of Lewis and most of the collections published after he died--a dozen more.

Lewis is now known most of all for the seven books of the Chronicles of Narnia. All of them made into movies I will never see (I don't watch movies of novels I love.)

But Lewis is also a novelist. His Till We Have Faces is, I think, his best book and among the better novels of the 20th Century. Jim's description of the book and it's place in 20th Century literature is excellent.

Lewis is also a Christian apologist, a lecturer, a BBC radio personality during WWII, essayist, book reviewer, and a science fiction writer: Perelandra is a brilliant novel, and a literary critic of considerable reputation. Jim's most recent book is about Perelandra.

Jim's Very Short Introduction convey's all of this in 128 pages. If you have read only some of Lewis, this book will tell you what to read next.

And I will also suggest what to read next: If you haven't read The Four Loves or the essay "The Inner Ring," they should be your next read.

First 40 books of 2022:

English Literature in the Sixteenth Century excluding drama by C.S. Lewis

Le veritable histoire des petits cochons by Erik Belgard

The Iliad or the Poem of Force by Simone Weil

Game of Thrones, Book 5 by George R.R. Martin

Irony and Sarcasm by Roger Kreutz

Essential Elements by Matt Tweed