Lewis, C(live) S(taples)

Lewis, C(live) S(taples) (1898-1963), English critic, scholar, and novelist.

Born in Belfast, Ireland, Lewis was the son of a solicitor. He was educated privately and at the University of Oxford. A fellow and tutor at Oxford from 1925 to 1954, he was subsequently professor of medieval and Renaissance English literature at the University of Cambridge.

Lewis's first major critical work was Allegory of Love: A Study in Medieval Tradition (1936), which examines the connections between medieval literature and courtly love and established his scholarly reputation. He was better known to the general public, however, for books in which he examined and explained moral and religious problems. His Perelandra trilogy, which began with Out of the Silent Planet (1938), was an unprecedented fusion of science fiction, fantasy, and allegory. Works examining the beliefs of traditional Christianity, based in part on radio lectures he did for the British Broadcasting Company during World War II, included Beyond Personality (1940), Miracles (1947), and Mere Christianity (1952). Best known was The Screwtape Letters (1942), in which a senior devil sardonically instructs his apprentice nephew in methods of mortal temptation. Lewis described his own conversion to Christianity in Surprised by Joy (1955). He also wrote a popular series of children's books known as the Chronicles of Narnia, which began in 1950 with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.