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Learning Journal 5

Awesome

Source 1

Books review

Learning Journal 1

Profound.

C.S. Lewis' Advice on Writing

I've been working on a final paper, and part of that process has included browsing through some of Lewis' letters.  Here is one I found addressed to "a schoolgirl in America" on December 14th, 1959.

1. Turn off the Radio [or for us, Facebook, TV, Twitter, Pandora, Cell Phones.  Wow it certainly got more complicated, didn't it?]
2. Read all the good books you can, and avoid nearly all magazines
3. Always write (and read) with the ear, not the eye.  You should hear every sentence you write as if it was being read aloud or spoken.  If it does not sound nice, try again.
4. Write about what really interests you, whether it is real things or imaginary things, and nothing else.  (Notice this means that if you are interested only in writing you will never be a writer, because you will have nothing to write about...)
5. Take great pains to be clear.  Remember that though you start by knowing what you mean, the reader doesn't, and a single ill-chosen word may lead him to a total misunderstanding.  In a story it is terribly easy just to forget that you have not told the reader something that he wants to know- the whole picture is so clear in your own mind that you forget that it isn't the same in his.
6. When you give up a bit of work don't (unless it is hopelessly bad) throw it away.  Put it in a drawer.  It may come in useful later.  Much of my best work, or what I think my best, is the re-writing of things begun and abandoned years earlier.
7. Don't use a typewriter.  The nose will destroy your sense of rhythm, which still needs years of training. [I wonder what Lewis would say about computers.]
8. Be sure you know the meaning (or meanings) of very word you use

Just thought I would share!

Thinking about Paper Topics

"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable."
— C.S. Lewis (The Four Loves) 

 

This quote, coming from The Four Loves, has been one of my favorites for years.  Having now read The Four Loves, I am grateful for the context that gives.  

I have a lot of thoughts when it comes to this topic of suffering and love.  This last summer I spent three months living with a Tibetan Buddhist family in Dharamsala, India.  While I was there I had a lot of opportunities to study Buddhism and Eastern religious philosophy.  Buddha taught that all life leads to suffering so long as you are attached to anything-whether that be your own individual identity, possessions, or personal relationships you feel attachment towards beyond just a general sense of the word "love."  This was the most difficult aspect of the religion for me to swallow.  To me, it feels like a way to cheat the importance of experiencing life.  The joy along with the often inevitable pain.

In this sense, I agree with Lewis.  I believe that to love and be hurt by that love is much better than to not love at all.  As I first started thinking about different paper ideas, the topic of Christian marriage tended to pop up, but this aspect of it seems to be a little more engaging.  Even though it is the end of the semester, and I am busy working on finals and my thesis, I want to make this paper a good representation of all that I learned throughout the semester. 

 

 

The Shadowlands by William Nicholson

Shadowlands by William Nicholson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Reading this play was a much different experience than the rest of the works we have read thus far. It is the only book on our list that is not actually written by C.S. Lewis, and in that sense it was kind of refreshing to have an outsider's opinion and interpretation of Lewis' life.

The first question that I asked myself while reading this drama was how accurate it really is. In our class discussion we addressed this concern. It is, overall, a fictional work, but there are some factual elements in it. For example: we learned that the poem Joy reads to Lewis, as well as Lewis' justification for marrying Joy (her first marriage did not count since her husband was already married a first time), were accurate. However, some of the details on time were not accurate. Joy was living in London before she came to Oxford, and their meeting was not exactly how it appeared in this drama. Also, C.S. Lewis was not a kind of withdrawn, somber sort of man. Rather, he was outspoken and extroverted. Him and his wife would often go to the pub and do karaoke. He loved her because she was able to dish it right back at him.


Overall, I was really grateful for the experience to read The Shadowlands. I appreciated the insights in class that helped me place it in proper perspective, but all in all I think Nicholson did an excellent job capturing C.S. Lewis.

After reading this play, I am really looking forward to reading the movie adaptation.  This is a remarkable and unique love story!


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