Of the Inklings, C.S. Lewis has had the greatest impact on generations of Christian scholars. Inside of the Torrey leadership, I would guess he is the author with the greatest shared impact on all of us.
He certainly changed my life. I am a Christian in great part because of the role his works had in shaping my imagination. I am the kind of Christian I am, because Lewis wrote and lived as he did.
There is no moment I can remember when Lewis has not been one of my primary literary guides. As a child my basement room had a map of Narnia carefully rolled out on a table in the middle of my work space. My first club formed with my brother and a dear cousin attempted a unification of Narnia with all our other favorite writers. We played at Narnia . . . hard enough to scar ourselves with metal swords carefully constructed out of scrap metal.
Later my imaginative life turned to Bradbury and Asimov, but Lewis was there as well. Finally, years of reflecting on his views regarding education and friendship led (with other influences) to the establishment of the Torrey Honors Institute at Biola.
C.S. Lewis was the first writer who inspired me to read all of his works . . . or at least all his works I could find.
Here are the five Lewis books that changed my life. They may not be his best, but they worked for me. They are listed in their order of influence, most important to least.
I hold myself to a short personal description of each:
That Hideous Strength
I think I have read it every year, since Dad, bless him, gave it to me.
Descriptions of the N.I.C.E. warned me against big government combined with big education, a warning that would be useful later in life. The temptations of Mark to find an “inner ring” have been good warnings to me that I have not always heeded. The picture of Saint Anne’s in the book gave our present house a name and our home a philosophy of community.
Abolition of Man
The essays in this book made me consider that beauty might, just might, be more than opinion. This book must influenced me in my late twenties and early thirties.
If I had only thought about this book more deeply, I might have avoided serious and harmful errors. Later, I came to see that my own opinions were less important than the truth. I learned that what is worthy of love mattered a great deal more than what I wanted or liked loving. By God’s grace, it brought me not just to repentance, but to a life long quest to mold my life after objective goodness, truth, and beauty.
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
This was my first “quest” book and an early Narnia favorite.
I wanted to sail with Caspian and be Reepicheep’s squire. The longing for the true West came to me during this book and it has gone. It does not haunt me so much as inspire me.
Every summer when I go to the Pacific Ocean it strikes me again and I long to sail to the heart’s true home.
Perelandra
If I had loved this book earlier as much as I do now, many sorrows would have been averted.
It contains the most attractive view of chastity, prudence, and desire I have read. The view of the cosmos in it is one that is appealing and more likely (in the Platonic sense) than most of the modern nonsense I was taught.
This is a nearly “great book” which has never had an adequate title.
The Last Battle
This is my favorite view of ending and heaven outside the Bible.
It made me sad as a child, because it meant no more Narnia books. I love it as an adult, because it promises no real ending to the great adventures and a hope that whatever Narnia is really someday I can go there.
There are five books by Lewis that changed my life. What are yours?