C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis
Clive Staples Lewiswas a British novelist, poet, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian, broadcaster, lecturer, and Christian apologist. He held academic positions at both Oxford University, 1925–54, and Cambridge University, 1954–63. He is best known for his fictional work, especially The Screwtape Letters, The Chronicles of Narnia, and The Space Trilogy, and for his non-fiction Christian apologetics, such as Mere Christianity, Miracles, and The Problem of Pain...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionAuthor
Date of Birth29 November 1898
CountryIreland
...the sun looks down on nothing half so good as a household laughing together over a meal, or two friends talking over a pint of beer, or a man alone reading a book that interests him..." - C.S. Lewis: Weight of Glory
If one has to choose between reading the new books and reading the old, one must choose the old: not because they are necessarily better but because they contain precisely those truths of which our own age is neglectful.
We do not enjoy a story fully at the first reading. Not till the curiosity, the sheer narrative lust, has been given its sop and laid asleep, are we at leisure to savour the real beauties.
I wrote this story for you, but when I began it I had not realized that girls grow quicker than books. As a result you are already too old for fairy tales, and by the time it is printed and bound you will be older still. But some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again. You can then take it down from some upper shelf, dust it, and tell me what you think of it. I shall probably be too deaf to hear, and too old to understand a word you say, but I shall still be your affectionate Godfather, C. S. Lewis.
No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally – and often far more – worth reading at the age of fifty and beyond.
Ideally, we should like to define a good book as one which 'permits, invites, or compels' good reading
Those of us who are blamed when old for reading childish books were blamed when children for reading books too old for us.
It is my opinion that a story worth reading only in childhood is not worth reading even then.
The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books.
Looking for God-or Heaven-by exploring space is like reading or seeing all Shakespeare's plays in the hope that you will find Shakespeare as one of the characters...
In Science we have been reading only the notes to a poem; in Christianity we find the poem itself.
I can't imagine a man really enjoying a book and reading it only once.
But in general, take my advice, when you meet anything that is going to be Human and isn’t yet, or used to be Human once and isn’t now, or ought to be Human and isn’t, you keep your eyes on it and feel for your hatchet.
If you are worried about the people outside, the most unreasonable thing you can do is remain outside yourself. Christians are Christ's body...every addition to that body enables Him to do more. If you want to help those outside you must add your own little cell to the body of Christ who along can help them. Cutting off a man's fingers would be a odd way of getting him to do more work.