The cultural mood of the High Sixties was well captured by Tom Wolfe in his 1987 essay “The Great Relearning.” Everything was to be swept aside, so that culture could be reconstructed by an “unprecedented start from zero.”754 Other religious and literary prophets arose in America and Europe, and Lewis fell by the wayside. Lewis was a distinctly religious voice in a coming secular age, and more important, he advocated taking the past seriously, when most wanted to abandon it altogether as an embarrassing liability.
On the literary front, the impact of Lewis’s imaginative writings—including the Narnia series—was overshadowed by the astonishing success of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, which achieved cult status during the 1960s, especially once cheap paperback editions began to appear in the United States. Tolkien waxed as Lewis waned. The intricate structure and deep backstory of The Lord of the Rings pointed to a sophistication and profundity that seemed lacking in Narnia.
Tolkien’s epic narrative of the pathology of power chimed in with the anxieties of that age concerning nuclear holocausts. Though conceived long before the advent of the atom bomb, Tolkien’s “one ring to rule them all” seemed a powerful image of the lure of a weapon of supreme destructive force, and the power it conveyed on its apparent masters—who were, in reality, its slaves. Much to Tolkien’s surprise, he now found himself idolised by exactly the sort of students he would have once thrown out of his Oxford lectures.
Rediscovery: The New Interest in Lewis
Yet Lewis bounced back. It is relatively straightforward to account for Lewis’s rise to fame, first in the dark wartime period of the early 1940s, and then again as Narnia wove its imaginative magic throughout the 1950s. But that does not explain the resurgence of interest in Lewis a generation later. Many popular writers of the 1940s and 1950s simply sank without a trace. For example, consider the five American top fiction bestsellers of 1947:
Russell Janney, The Miracle of the Bells
Thomas B. Costain, The Moneyman
Laura Z. Hobson, Gentleman’s Agreement
Kenneth Roberts, Lydia Bailey
Frank Yerby, The Vixens755
All of these books can still be purchased today, generally from specialist, secondhand dealers. But despite their initial blaze of glory, they have all faded. Why is Lewis different?
We can map out some possible lines of exploration that at least help us understand—even if they do not really “explain” in the stronger sense of the term—the resurgence of interest in Lewis. It is relatively easy to identify some pieces of the jigsaw; the problem is that we do not fully understand how they fit into a bigger picture.
First, collections of previously unpublished or inaccessible material by Lewis began to appear. These were largely the result of the dedicated editorial work of Walter Hooper, who had acted as a private secretary to Lewis in the summer of 1963, and subsequently served as Lewis’s literary executor after the death of Cecil Harwood in 1975. Hooper had consulted with Lewis during his lifetime on developing a complete bibliography of his works. When this was first published in 1965, it ran to 282 items, not including letters.756
In the early 1970s, the leading British publisher William Collins & Sons bought the rights to Lewis’s publications, and established the Fount imprint to give them a distinct identity within the company. Over the next decade, Hooper brought out a steady trickle of collected essays with Collins—such as Screwtape Proposes a Toast (1965); Of This and Other Worlds (1966); Christian Reflections (1967); Fern-Seed and Elephants (1975); and God in the Dock (1979).757 These new collections expanded the horizons of those who already knew Lewis, while introducing him to others. Hooper insisted that the publication of any new collection of Lewis’s material should be matched by the reprint of two of his earlier works, thus ensuring that his less popular works—such as The Pilgrim’s Regress and The Abolition of Man—remained in print.758
Most recently, and possibly most significantly, Hooper edited the 3,500 pages of Lewis’s correspondence (2000–2006), allowing Lewis’s intellectual, social, and spiritual trajectory to be tracked in detail. These letters, essential to Lewis scholarship, form the narrative backbone of this biography.
Second, a series of significant societies were formed in the United States, dedicated to preserving Lewis’s memory and legacy. The first of these was the New York C. S. Lewis Society, founded in 1969. Others soon followed, creating associations through which devotees of Lewis could gather to discuss his work. Those who were enthused about Lewis in the 1940s and 1950s sought to pass that enthusiasm on to others in the 1970s. In 1974, the Marion E. Wade Center, dedicated to the life and works of Lewis and his circle, was established at Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois, building on an earlier collection of material brought together by Clyde S. Kilby (1902–1986), a former professor of English at Wheaton College. Lewis’s homeland was somewhat slow to follow suit: the Oxford C. S. Lewis Society was established as late as 1982. The institutionalisation of the Lewis legacy had begun. Networks were established that facilitated the intergenerational transmission of his legacy.
Third, well-written biographies began to appear from the pens of those close to Lewis, allowing their readers to grasp what he was like. The first was C. S. Lewis: A Biography (1974), written jointly by Roger Lancelyn Green and Walter Hooper. Green (1918–1987), a former student of Lewis’s at Oxford, had gone on to write children’s books himself, and had authored important biographies of British children’s writers—most notably, his studies of J. M. Barrie (1960) and Lewis Carroll (1960). Hooper and Green’s biography was followed by Jack (1988) by George Sayer, another close friend. These remain landmarks in Lewis studies. Though inevitably lacking critical distance, both of these biographies revealed details of Lewis’s personal life which portrayed him as a human being and gave added depth to a reading of some of his works.
Finally, we might note how the great surge of interest in Tolkien in the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s indirectly benefitted Lewis. As it became increasingly clear that Tolkien was not a solitary Oxford writer, but was linked with the group now generally known as the Inklings, attention was paid once more to the most prominent member of that group—C. S. Lewis. The always large number of American graduate students studying at Oxford began to explore the haunts of Tolkien and Lewis, the students taking both their memories and their enthusiasm home with them. (With this trend in mind, tourist maps of Oxford now show the precise location of the Eagle and Child.)
Lewis has always been appreciated more in the United States than in England, despite never once setting foot stateside. This is partly due to the intellectual and cultural prestige of Oxford University in American eyes. Lewis is one of the elite group of bestselling children’s authors who were also Oxford dons—including Lewis Carroll and J. R. R. Tolkien. Lewis’s Cambridge period tends to be glossed over by many American commentators, who often refer to him simply as an “Oxford don.”
Yet Lewis now rides high in America only partly for cultural reasons; there is a significant religious element to his appeal. Lewis is trusted and respected by many American Christians, who treat him as their theological and spiritual mentor. Engaging both heart and mind, Lewis opened up the intellectual and imaginative depths of the Christian faith like nobody else. As Lewis himself pointed out in his broadcast talks during the Second World War, he was simply an educated layman, who spoke directly and accessibly to ordinary Christians over the heads of their clergy. Lewis proved ideally attuned to the pedagogical needs and abilities of laypeople, irrespective of their denomination, who wanted to explore their faith further.
Irrespective of their denomination. We must linger over this crucial point. During the 1960s, the first signs began to emerge of an erosion of denominationalism in American Protestantism. Protestant Christians began to define themselves primarily as Christians, and secondarily by denomination, reflecting an increasingly loose commitment to a denomination as a marker of religious identity.759 A Presbyterian might become a Method
ist upon moving to a new town or state, if the local Methodist church offered better child care or preaching. A church’s denomination came to be seen as of lesser importance than the quality of its preaching and pastoral care. Seminaries began to drop denominationally specific titles. Thus the Protestant Episcopal Theological Seminary in Virginia became Virginia Theological Seminary. Lewis’s notion of “mere Christianity” spoke powerfully into this trend, with Lewis achieving a high degree of acceptance across denominations precisely because he avoided advocating any specific form of Christianity. Lewis’s Mere Christianity became the manifesto for a form of Christianity that exulted in essentials, regarding other matters as secondary.
American Catholics began to read Lewis in the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965). This landmark council, convened by Pope John XXIII (1881–1963), aimed to reconnect Catholicism with other Christian churches, and encourage a deeper engagement with contemporary culture. Before this, Catholics tended to regard the works of other Christian writers as being of questionable orthodoxy and utility. The council opened the way for Catholics to read and respect non-Catholic authors—such as Lewis. Lewis now gained a growing Catholic readership both as a close friend of J. R. R. Tolkien and as an admirer of G. K. Chesterton, neither of whose Catholic credentials could be questioned. Leading American Catholics, such as Cardinal Avery Dulles (1918–2008) and Peter Kreeft (1937– ), began to champion Lewis as a “mere Christian” whom Catholics could take seriously. Many who converted to Catholicism in the last two decades have cited Lewis as an important influence, despite Lewis’s original Ulster Protestant cultural roots.760
Yet there is another point, too easily overlooked, which is of especial importance for American Catholics today. “Mere Christianity” avoids more than “denominational imperialism”; it also avoids the abuses of power and privilege that too easily arise when denominations and their leaders see their own preservation as taking priority over the well-being of the Christian faith itself. Lewis represents a lay form of Christianity which has no special place for clergy or ecclesiastical institutions. My conversations with American Catholics suggest that many of them, increasingly disenchanted with the failings of their bishops and dioceses, find in Lewis a voice that allows them to reclaim their faith without having also to affirm the institutions they believe to have tarnished that faith in recent years. Will Lewis become the voice of those who are demanding reform and renewal of overclericalised churches?
It is clear that Lewis’s writings have now found a new audience far beyond his original admirers. He has come to be seen as a trustworthy, intelligent, and above all accessible representative of a theologically and culturally attractive vision of the Christian faith. The fact that Lewis was an outsider to the United States worked to his advantage, in that it allowed him to be seen as a unifying figure, rising above local American denominational disputes and debates. Lewis has become that rarest of phenomena—a modern Christian writer regarded with respect and affection by Christians of all traditions.
Lewis and American Evangelicals
A growing number of those Americans who profited from reading Lewis in the 1970s were evangelicals. A generation after his death, Lewis has become a cultural and religious icon for the movement. Some have now even spoken of Lewis as the “patron saint” of American evangelicalism. So how did a movement that initially regarded Lewis with intense suspicion come eventually to embrace him, and then to enthrone him? To understand the somewhat unexpected rise of Lewis’s influence within the American evangelical constituency, we need to reflect on the changing face of American evangelicalism since 1945.
During the 1920s, American evangelicalism was shaped by the rise of fundamentalism, which led to evangelicals developing a significant degree of cultural disengagement and isolationism. The mood within the movement began to change in the late 1940s, partly through the influence of writers such as Billy Graham (1918– ) and Carl F. H. Henry (1913–2003), who strongly advocated engagement with mainstream American culture. This “new evangelicalism,” initially a minority trend, grew apace, taking its lead from individuals such as Graham, publications such as Christianity Today, and institutions such as Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California.761 This new form of American evangelicalism was a strongly populist movement, capturing the hearts and wills of many. But many noted that it had yet to engage the mind, or see the importance of connecting with the intellectual subculture.
As American evangelicals sought refreshment of the mind as well as the soul, they found what they lacked in British writers—above all, from within the Church of England. During the 1950s and 1960s, the leading British evangelical John R. W. Stott (1921–2011) developed an intellectually rigorous approach to evangelicalism, which was warmly received in the United States. Stott’s approach itself may have lacked populist appeal, but it was strong on rational reflection on faith. Stott became a hero for American evangelicals who wanted to love God with all their minds. His Basic Christianity (1958) was a masterpiece of reasoned argument, setting out to demonstrate the “intellectual respectability” of Christian faith.
Then evangelicals started reading Lewis. It is difficult to date this development with any precision, but anecdotal evidence suggests it dates from the mid-1970s. Hints of an evangelical recognition of Lewis’s wisdom can, however, be seen much earlier, particularly on the part of its leaders. Though few knew of it, both John Stott and Billy Graham sought Lewis’s counsel as they prepared for Graham’s mission to the University of Cambridge in 1955.762 In that same year, Carl F. H. Henry had invited Lewis to write some apologetic pieces for the flagship evangelical journal Christianity Today.763
Evangelical leaders who came to faith from a secular background in the 1970s often cited Lewis’s Mere Christianity as a core influence in their conversion—such as Charles “Chuck” Wendell Colson (1931–2012), the special adviser to President Richard Nixon, who became implicated in the Watergate scandal and rose to prominence within evangelical circles after his conversion in 1973. Evangelical writers now began to cite Lewis in their works, especially his Mere Christianity, encouraging their readers to value this important author and explore him further.
As evangelicalism intensified its commitment to cultural engagement, the importance of apologetics became increasingly clear. Lewis was rapidly recognised by evangelicals as a master of that art. John Stott’s apologetic approach in Basic Christianity relied on its readers already knowing something about the Bible, and being willing to have biblical passages explained to them. Lewis made few such demands in Mere Christianity, basing his apologetic approach on general principles, fine observation, and an appeal to shared human experience.
Evangelical student organisations, such as InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, now began to make Lewis’s works part of their staple diet, valuing both their accessibility and their rhetorical power. Those in the know forgave Lewis for not being an evangelical; most evangelicals, however, simply saw Lewis as one of their own. After all, had he not been converted from atheism? That, for many, was enough to allow Lewis to be seen as a “born-again” Christian.
As American evangelicals read Lewis, they encountered a vision of the Christian faith that they found to be intellectually robust, imaginatively compelling, and ethically fertile. Those who initially valued Lewis for his rational defence of the Christian faith now found themselves appreciating his appeal to the imagination and emotions. Lewis’s multilayered conception of Christianity enabled evangelicals to realise that they could enrich their faith without diluting it, and engage secular culture in ways other than through reasoned argument.
Yet Lewis’s growing acceptance within evangelicalism reflects more than his winsome and accessible presentation of the Christian faith. A major cultural transition made Lewis even more attractive and significant. Nobody really knows when modernity finally lost out to postmodernity in the United States—or why. Some argue it happened in the 1960s; others in the 1980s. Yet there is no doubt abou
t the outcome of this cultural shift. Intuitive modes of reflection, shaped by images and stories, have trumped logical argument, based solely on reason.
John Stott’s strongly didactic approach to faith in Basic Christianity had many modernist virtues; yet with the rise of postmodernism, its approach increasingly seemed to belong to a previous generation. Basic Christianity was virtually devoid of any appeal to the imagination, or any recognition of the emotional dimensions of faith. As American evangelicals came to realise the importance of narrative and imagination in the life of faith, they turned instead to Lewis as their guide.
Lewis allowed his readers to grasp and benefit from the importance of images and stories for the life of faith, without losing sight of the robustly reasonable nature of the Christian gospel. Where older American evangelicals spent their time taking potshots at postmodernity during the 1980s and early 1990s, the writings of Lewis allowed younger evangelicals to connect with this new cultural mood. Where the Old Guard urged their younger followers to shun this trend, Lewis allowed them to engage it powerfully and persuasively.
In a 1998 article marking the centenary of Lewis’s birth, Christianity Today declared that Lewis had come to be “the Aquinas, the Augustine, and the Aesop of contemporary evangelicalism.”764 There is no doubt that Lewis has been instrumental in changing the cultural outlook of American evangelicalism. In the 1950s, evangelicalism was suspicious of literature, movies, and the arts.765 Evangelical admiration for Lewis may have begun with respect for his ideas; it soon developed into a respect for the modes and manners in which Lewis expressed those ideas.
By the mid-1980s, evangelical colleges—such as the flagship Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois—were encouraging evangelicals to engage with literature as a means of enriching their faith, appealing to Lewis as an exemplar. To date, evangelical engagement has focussed primarily on a group of writers clustered around Lewis or historically linked with him—namely, Owen Barfield, G. K. Chesterton, George MacDonald, J. R. R. Tolkien, Dorothy L. Sayers, and Charles Williams. It remains to be seen where this development will lead; there are, however, now clear signs that evangelicalism has begun to grasp the potential of literature to enrich, communicate, and commend faith.
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