All My Road Before Me

by C. S. Lewis

  In the town we bought two pork pies to supplement what W considered the Spartan allowance of sandwiches given us by the mess, and drank some beer. I think it was here that W formed the project of going far out of the way to eat our lunch at Hunton Bridge on the L.N.W.R. where we used to sit and watch the trains when out on our walks from Wynyard. I assented eagerly. I love to exult in my happiness at being forever safe from at least one of the major ills of life—that of being a boy at school.

  We bowled along very merrily in brilliant sunshine, while the country grew uglier and meaner at every turn, and therefore all the better for our purpose. We arrived at the bridge and devoured the scene—the two tunnels, wh. I hardly recognised at first, but memory came back. Of course things were changed. The spinney of little saplings had grown quite high. The countryside was no longer the howling waste it once looked to us. We ate our egg sandwiches and pork pies and drank our bottled beer. In spite of W’s fears it was as much as we could do to get through them all. But then, as he pointed out, this was appropriate to the scene. We were behaving just as we would have done fifteen years earlier. ‘Having eaten every thing in sight, we are now finished.’ We had a lot of glorious reminiscent talk. We developed our own version of ‘si jeunesse savait’: if we could only have seen as far as this out of the hell of Wynyard. I felt a half comic, half savage pleasure (Hobbe’s ‘sudden glory’) to think how by the mere laws of life we had completely won and Oldy had completely lost. For here were we with our stomachs full of sandwiches sitting in the sun and wind, while he had been in hell these ten years.

  We drove on and had tea at Aylesbury—dizzy by now and stupid with fresh air—and got to Oxford before seven.

  Saturday–Monday 5–7 July: On Saturday . . . W and I (after I had done the lunch wash up) biked to Wantage Road where he wanted to take a photo of the fastest train in England. We did this successfully and looked out for a suitable place for tea on the return journey.

  A countryman told us that there was no pub near, but that we could get tea at the—it sounded like Dog House. We both felt sure there could be no place called the Dog House, yet presently found it. Here we had strange adventures. I rang at the closed door—it is a little red house under a woodside—and waited for ten minutes: then rang again. At last a very ancient beldame appeared. I asked if we could have some tea. She looked hard at me and asked ‘Are you golfers?’: on my answering ‘no’ she shut the door softly and I could hear her hobbling away into the bowels of the house. I felt like Arthur at Orgolio’s Castle.

  Anon the ancient dame appeared again and, looking even harder at me, asked me a second time what I wanted. I repeated that we wanted some tea. She brought her face closer to mine and then with the air of one who comes at last to the real point asked ‘How long do you want it for?’ I was quite unable to answer this question but by God’s grace the witch left me multa parantem dicere57 and hobbled away once more.

  This time she left the door open and we walked in and found our way to a comfortable dining room where a plentiful and quite unmagical tea was presently brought us. We sat here for a very long time. A storm of wind got up (raised, I make no doubt, by our hostess, who, by the by, may have been the matriarchal dreadfulness) and the ivy lashed the windows.

  On the next day, Sunday, we went to bathe at Parson’s Pleasure with Pat who swam twice across the Cherwell. W. left us on Monday. While he was here I read and finished France’s Revolt of the Angels. A good book—but I can not get over real Frenchness. When a young man, on being rebuked by his father for an amour, first feels an impulse to burst into tears, secondly an inclination to fall on his knees, and finally draws a red herring across the trail by drawing the parental attention to the immoralities of his sister—one cannot remain in the aesthetic sphere. A bad smell is beyond the reach of art.

  Wednesday–Wednesday 9–16 July: I spent most of this time looking up the books I was to examine in: and the books which I wrongly believed I was to examine in: Lamb, Wordsworth, Macbeth, Hamlet, Richard II, Lear, Twelfth Night, Eōthen, David Copperfield and Macaulay’s Chatham and Clive.

  This is the first time I had looked into Macaulay for many years: I hope it will be many years before I read him again. It’s not the style (in the narrower sense) that’s the trouble—it’s a very good style within its own limits. But the man is a humbug—a vulgar, shallow, self satisfied mind, absolutely inaccessible to the complexities and delicacies of the real world. He has the journalist’s air of being a specialist in everything, of taking in all points of view and being always on the side of the angels: he merely annoys a reader who has had the least experience of knowing things, of what knowing is like. There is not two pence worth of real thought or real nobility in him. But he isn’t dull.

  These were days of lovely sunshine and I bathed nearly every day and lay out naked in the sun.

  On Wednesday I got my first batch of papers to correct—Higher Certificate Shakespeare—and began work.

  Thursday–Tuesday 17–29 July: All these days I worked hard on my examining. At first I had to interrupt myself several times to go in and ‘collaborate’ with my fellow examiners for the Locals at the rooms of the Senior Examiner, one Simpson, a parson, in Museum Road. This collaboration was not such a nuisance as I expected: Simpson was v. pleasant and a help, not a hindrance. Here I met Rice-Oxley whom I knew at Keble: also an interesting Major Grey.

  When this was over I settled into the following routine. I had breakfast at quarter to eight. For the first few mornings I was so sick that I had only a piece of toast, and even then I was sick a few moments later. I started work at eight and continued till lunch. While drinking my after lunch tea I walked for five minutes or so in the garden. I then began work again and continued till 6.45 or seven, taking my afternoon tea while I worked. At seven I walked over into Old Headington and had a whiskey and soda and came back for supper. Immediately after supper I began again and went on till twelve o’clock when I went to bed.

  At first this routine told upon me very severely in the form of sickness, headache, and above all, nerves. I had a terrible reaction each night when I went to bed, feeling quite cowed and shaky. After a few days however I got my second wind and it became a normal and tolerable mode of life.

  Poor D suffered as much, if not more than I did. For the first few days Valerie Evans was here as Maureen’s guest and of course neither she nor Maureen gave the least help. What mortal dare interrupt their pleasures. D thus had a household of four humans and five v. troublesome animals to look after single handed. In addition she was suffering from sickness, like myself, and from corns: she could get no shoes which did not hurt her.

  Valerie is prettier than ever: but the knowledge of this fact is rapidly spoiling her. Her main interest is now dress and she has adopted—perhaps innocently and unconsciously (et mentem Venus ipsa dedit)58—all those provocative little mannerisms which underline the fact that blind nature made her for one purpose. If only pretty women would realise with how many and with what people they share the power of attracting in this way!

  Wednesday 30 July: I had now got through the worst of my papers and as there was no hurry over the rest, I took a day’s holiday. The previous routine work had however left me in no way visibly the worse: indeed I have much more horror of it in retrospect than I had at the time. Today I bought a copy of Tom Jones and began to read it . . .

  Friday–Sunday 1–3 August: I continued now my old routine for morning and afternoon, but instead of continuing till midnight I usually finished at 6.30: then had my drink, washed up after supper and read Tom Jones in the evening. As I came near the end I found it harder to keep my mind on the work and instead of doing the papers. I wanted to reflect how few there were still to do.

  Tom Jones is a good book. I don’t know how it got the reputation of being libidinous. The real point about it is the pure narrative power: it has such a momentum. When novels switch off from one group of characters to another one is usually irritated: Fielding always makes
you feel that it is just what you want. The mock Homeric parts are capital—far better than those in The Battle of the Books.59 What surprised me most was the real romantic feeling in the scene wh. introduces the Man of the Hill: though of course his story is rubbish.

  Dorothea (or Dotty or Toddy or Totty, for D has not yet settled her name) seems to have many good qualities. She seems plain at first, but her face improves on acquaintance and becomes really rather comely at times. She is the very antithesis of Valerie. She believes herself to be plain, always has holes in her stockings and seldom has clean hands, has girlishly violent views on powder and over interest in clothes: all of wh. is to the good. She is absolutely unaffected—a loud, floundering, untidy, excitable person, all over a room at once: in shape, to quote Stephens ‘a lank anatomy all leg and hair and stare like a young colt’. Intellectually, on the other hand, she is far older than any girls I have met from this school: has read fairly widely and is full of extreme views on all imaginable subjects—just as one ought to be at her age. She is the only one of Maureen’s friends who has ever shown the least consideration for D, for whom she has bought oranges—these being now v. hard to get.

  1925

  After the entry for 1–3 August 1924 Lewis gave up his diary until 6 February 1925. He was very busy during this period correcting Local Examination Papers and preparing to take over Mr Carritt’s teaching. On 14 October 1924 he began his course of twice-weekly lectures for the University entitled ‘The Good: Its Position Among the Values’ as well as tutorials for University College.

  Jack and Warnie were with their father in Belfast from 23 December 1924 to 10 January 1925, after which Warnie stopped at ‘Hillsboro’ for a week.

  Hilary Term began on 11 January 1925 and on 23 January Lewis began a twice-weekly course of lectures entitled ‘Moral Good: Its Position Among Values’. When the diary is resumed on 6 February we find Lewis giving tutorials at University College and correcting School Certificate Essays in his spare time.

  Friday 6 February: Into town as usual after breakfast. Buckley brought me an essay on deduction—better than last time.1 I find it hard to make myself understood with him—we are always at cross purposes. Next came Hogg with whom I read the first and second analogies.2 Swanwick came in to join us, but as he works with Watson’s selections we found it impossible to harmonise and sent him away.3

  At 12 I went to the Payne for my lecture. Today my audience had dwindled to two—Hawker and the old parson. As they professed a wish to continue the course, I had them to my room. I said we could now be informal and I hoped they would interrupt whenever they wanted. The old parson availed himself of this so liberally that I could hardly get a word in. He seems to be a mono maniac—he has some grudge against the Archbishop of York—who came in twice—I forget how. He also has some psychological hobby horse about ‘the hedonic tone of psychosis’ wh. came in more than once. The funniest thing was when he said that an object qua cognition could not attract: he held out a very ugly hand with hair on the back and stubbed nails and said ‘Now suppose I have an object here—a quite unattractive object.’4 Hawker promised to back me up.5

  Home by 1.30 and an excellent lunch. After usual jobs I went for a walk up Shotover. Am just beginning to be conscious of the face of nature again after a long strange imprisonment in myself. Steel coloured sky, and a cold rain came on. Pat and I hid among trees on the top of Pullen’s Gap. On the way home one half of the sky was grey cloud but there was a huge blue gap over Wytham and glittering piles of white beyond it.

  Home for tea. Afterwards I set papers on the Merchant of Venice and started looking up a suitable ‘English Story’ for L[ocal] C[ertificate]. At 6.30 in to Hall.

  A man called Ingles was there as Keir’s guest who was apparently up with me, but I had forgotten him—now at Cuddesdon—rather a prig I think. Sat between Allen and Lawson.6 Quite good talk.

  Home by 9 o’clock. Read Matière et Mémoire in the evening.7

  Saturday 7 February: Beattie came this morning with a rather muddled but vigorous essay on the plurality of goods.8 We had an excellent discussion. Then came Donald on Kant’s causation.9 Interesting and paradoxical as usual, but not very solid. Finally came Swanwick without an essay, and I tried to hammer some interpretation of deduction into him. It is impossible to tell how much he understands . . .

  Walked out after lunch and bought Travels with a Donkey10 (which I need for L.C.) at Mowbray’s: then bussed home and walked up Shotover with Pat. Went to the grove at the far end by the path wh. has just been re-opened since the foot and mouth disease scare. Home with a headache after a beautiful walk. Maureen had Celia Waterhouse to tea—a dull girl. Read Travels with a Donkey in the evening: a glorious book if you could omit the Modestine parts. Lateish to bed.

  Monday 9 February: In after breakfast. Little Buchanan came with an essay on Utilitarianism, the first he’s done for me: really very good and already far beyond Swanwick.11 Next came Nash who thought two sides of a foolscap a sufficient essay on the Refutation of Idealism and appeared in discussion to have read hardly any of it. I made myself as unpleasant as I could about it, but I am not much good at this sort of thing.12

  I then went out and got an envelope to post my long delayed letter for Carritt and ordered Gadney’s to send over in the afternoon Sidgwick’s Historical Ballad for L.C. . . .

  After tea into College and worked over my Berkeley and Hume notes for tomorrow. Dined in. Haig, of my year (now in Nigeria) was there as Ley’s guest. A dull evening except for a few quips of Poynton’s. Bussed home—a windy moonlight night—and was collared for unseens by Dotty. Poor D still marmalading.

  Tuesday 10 February: Rather late up. Into town and worked on my Sidgwick paper for L.C. At 12 came Campbell—rather sleepy I thought, and not so good as usual.13 Keir and Lawson came for lunch: the usual brisk but not really interesting conversation. We are rather like the three curates in Shirley.

  Came home and took Pat for a walk in Cuckoo Lane. In at 5.30. Bradley and Gordon-Clark came: the former does nearly all the talking—he is a nephew of Appearance and Reality.14 They had brought me several questions on Berkeley and Hume, all of which I was able to answer, by good fortune.15

  Dined in hall and left at once to hurry to the theatre for the O.U.D.S. [production of] Peer Gynt. D, Maureen and Dotty were already there. I was v. disappointed in the play. The general idea of a history of the soul is all right, but Peer’s soul hasn’t enough in it to last for four hours: most of him is mere Nordic windbagism. No good making a story of Peer: you only want to kick his bottom and get on. The Troll parts from the visual point of view were the best stage devilment I’ve ever seen . . .

  Wednesday 11 February: Up at 7.30 and so to breakfast. Stevenson had been to the O.U.D.S. too and thought it excellent. Cox didn’t turn up. Henderson and, after him Ross the American.16

  Keir and Lawson for lunch. I quoted a line from the Prelude and Lawson thought it came from Rowbottom.

  Home and for a walk with Pat by the cemetery. Worked on Leibnitz in the evening in my new edition. He had wonderful insight in some ways: he has the sense for biology wh. none of his contemporaries get anywhere near.

  Early to bed, all rather tired. D still at the infernal marmalade.

  Thursday 12 February: In as usual in the morning and a walk in the afternoon. Back to town by 5.30 and took Firth—a fairly good hour.17 I dined in hall: several undergraduates from other colleges there as guests.

  Immediately afterwards I went to Ware’s rooms in Worcester St. for a meeting of the Phil. Soc.—I should have had some difficulty in finding them if I had not met Ewing. Ziman read his paper on causality. I, having heard it all from him in the morning, was rather bored. The discussion afterwards soon drifted off on to Touche’s and Dawson’s favourite position and I had an enjoyable argument. Home late—a wet night.

  Saturday 14 February: Beattie came this morning. I like this man really very well. Then came Donald who read a most pretentious essay, full of sil
ly epigrams, nominally on the plurality of goods, but as usual all Gentile18 and water. I applied the Socratic method, I think with some good results. What a lot of good a term with Kirk would do him! Finally came poor Swanwick.

  Lawson came to lunch: talked about Iceland which we both want to visit. Bought a copy of Peer Gynt (Everyman) and took Joachim’s Spinoza out of the Union.

  Bussed home. Took Pat down by the cemetery and got some rain: also a wonderful livid light over Otmoor. After tea I worked on Spinoza—I find the psychology (if one can call it that) very puzzling. Phippy was here. Thank heavens D has finished the marmalade. She had a touch of neuritis last night. Long conversation with Dotty and Maureen at supper time about the difference between men’s and women’s friendships.

  Sunday 15 February: . . . Got home about noon and sat in my old room where the fire had been lit to dry the damp out of the wall. I read thro’ ‘Dymer’ I–VI. I, II, IV, and V are better than I thought—if only I could have kept it up!

  After lunch I washed up and did the usual jobs, then worked on Leibnitz till tea time. D came and sat with me and we were very snug. After tea I took a spell off and read Mary Rose—a beautiful and suggestive play.19

  Then supper and while doing jars etc. afterwards I read most of the Master Builder and understood it much better than when I had seen it with Harwood at the Playhouse. Earlyish to bed—a most enjoyable day.