C.S. Lewis
1 book analyzed
Biography
Clive Staples Lewis (1898-1963) was an Oxford and Cambridge medievalist, Christian apologist, and one of the twentieth century's most influential writers of fantasy and theology. Born in Belfast, he lost his mother to cancer at age nine — a trauma that haunted his work and fueled his obsession with joy, loss, and worlds beyond this one. He served in the trenches of World War I, was wounded at the Battle of Arras, and carried shrapnel in his body for the rest of his life. An atheist for most of his young adulthood, he converted to Christianity in 1931, partly through conversations with his close friend J.R.R. Tolkien. He wrote The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in 1948-49, inspired in part by children evacuated to his home (The Kilns) during WWII. He was a member of the Inklings, the Oxford literary group that included Tolkien, Charles Williams, and Owen Barfield.