OXFORD TUTORIALS
C.S. LEWIS
ATRIUM
Course Description
This is a full year course of study (two semesters) which will provide an
introduction to and overview of the works of C.S. Lewis, including his most popular works
of fiction and non-fiction. Reading assignments will emphasize enjoyment and
comprehension. The first semester will cover all seven of the Chronicles of Narnia
and The Screwtape Letters. The second semester will include Mere Christianity,
The Great Divorce, The Abolition of Man and The Weight of Glory.
Students are given a schedule (see Course Schedule below) with weekly reading assignments
and study questions. Class sessions will include some lecture, discussion, reading
quizzes, and reading key scenes out loud. Students are given two assignments each
semester in addition to the weekly reading and quizzes (see Course Requirements
below). The instructor will be giving page references from the most recent Harper
& Scribner editions available (see Required Texts below).
Course
Schedule
Click here for the Master
Calendar (with Holidays, etc.)
FIRST SEM.
Week 1 The Magician's
Nephew (Chap. 1-8)
2 The Magician's Nephew (Chap.
9-15)
3 The Lion, the Witch & the
Wardrobe (Chap. 1-9)
4 The Lion, the Witch & the
Wardrobe (Chap. 10-17)
5 The Horse & His Boy (Chap. 1-7)
6 The Horse & His Boy (Chap. 8-15)
7 Prince Caspian (Chap. 1-8)
8 Prince Caspian (Chap. 9-15)
9 Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chap. 1-8)
10 Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chap. 9-16)
11 Silver
Chair (Chap. 1-8)
12 Silver Chair (Chap. 9-16)
13 The
Last Battle (Chap. 1-8)
14 The
Last Battle (Chap. 9-16)
15 The Screwtape Letters (Letters
1-16)
16 The Screwtape
Letters (Letters 17-31)
SECOND SEM.
Week 1 Mere Christianity: Book 1, Chaps. 1-5
2 Mere
Christianity: Book 2, Chaps. 1-5
3 Mere
Christianity: Book 3, Chaps. 1-4
4 Mere
Christianity: Book 3, Chaps. 5-7
5 Mere
Christianity: Book 3, Chaps.8-12
6 Mere
Christianity: Book 4, Chaps. 1-4
7 Mere
Christianity: Book 4, Chaps. 5-11
8 The Great
Divorce (Preface; Chap. 1-4)
9 The
Great Divorce (Chap. 5 - 9)
10 The Great
Divorce (Chap.10-14)
11 The Abolition of Man
(Chap. 1)
12 The Abolition of Man
(Chap. 2)
13 The Abolition of Man
(Chap. 3; Appendix)
14 The Weight of
Glory, Essays 1-3
15 The Weight of Glory,
Essays 4-6
16 The Weight of Glory,
Essays 7-9
Required Textbooks
First semester: Chronicles of
Narnia: The Magician's Nephew; The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe; The Horse
& His Boy; Prince Caspian; The Voyage of the Dawn Treader; The Silver Chair; The Last
Battle (Harper, 2002: Paperback Boxed Set ISBN 0064471195) and the Screwtape Letters (Harper,
2001: ISBN 0060652934).
Second semester: Mere Christianity (Harper, 2001:
ISBN 0060652926), The Abolition of
Man (Harper, 2001: ISBN 0060652942), the Great Divorce (Harper, 2001:
ISBN 0060652950) and the Weight of Glory (Harper,
2001: ISBN 0060653205). These books may be examined and/or
purchased online for a discount of 20-30%. Simply click on the blue title
above for a direct link to Amazon.com.
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Course Requirements
Students are responsible to keep up with the weekly reading assignments
and to take a reading quiz at the beginning of each class. The quiz will be given in
a "game show" format, with the instructor placing multiple choice questions on
the screen and keeping track of the students who are first to type in the correct answers.
The Study Questions are meant to be a guide to assist students with their reading
and comprehension. Students are not required to write out or turn in their answers to the
instructor. In addition to the weekly reading assignments and quizzes there will be two
other assignments each semester, as follows:
1st Assignment: Student’s Choice (A or
B):
Choice A: Write three limericks about Narnia. Either write
about Narnia in general (as in the example below), or write about some of the more
humorous characters like Eustace, Puddleglum, Shift, Puzzle, Rabadash, or the Dufflepuds.
At the beginning of the Voyage of the Dawn Treader Eustace tries to ridicule his
cousins by making up a silly limerick about Narnia. He fails miserably. He can’t even
get a good rhyme on the first two lines. The rule for a limerick is to write five lines,
making the sounds rhyme at the end of the 1st, 2nd, and 5th
lines. The 3rd and 4th lines should have a different rhyme, and be
shorter that the other three lines, like this:
Take a trip to a land far a-way
Where the an-imals sing, talk
and play
Where the King is a Lion
And the Witch ends up dyin’
And I know you will long--long
to stay!
When you create your limericks be careful both with the rhyme and the meter. The
trickiest part of the limerick for most students is the meter. The accents should
fall at the end of each pattern of syllables, as indicated above by the words in bold
print. Each set of syllables is called a metrical foot. A limerick
contains three metrical feet in lines one, two and five, and two metrical feet in lines
three and four. The pattern looks like this:
da da DUM da da DUM da da DUM
da da DUM da da DUM da da DUM
da da DUM da da DUM
da da DUM da da DUM
da da DUM da da DUM da da DUM
The scoring criteria for the limericks will include the following factors: Content;
Creativity; Meter; Rhyme; and Synthesis (how it all fits together).
Choice B: Create an original coat of arms. Banners and flags are important in the
Chronicles of Narnia. The Narnian flag is a rampant lion (standing on his hind legs)
representing Aslan, portrayed on a green field (background). In LWW the lion is red; in SC
he appears in gold. Coats of arms developed in the middle ages to mark the armor, shields
and coats of knights when wearing their helmets in battle or while jousting. The term
"coat of arms" comes from the display of a knight’s distinctive symbols on
the outer coat (surcoat) which was worn over the suit of armor. For help on creating a
coat of arms try visiting your local library, or visit sites on the Internet such as
these:
Heraldry on the Internet: http://www.digiserve.com/heraldry/
Medieval Times: http://www.suelebeau.com/medievaltimes.htm
Knighthood, Chivalry, & Tournaments Resource
Library: http://www.chronique.com/intro.htm
Be sure to include a written description of the coat of arms along with your artwork.
The decription should include a brief explanation of the different symbols, colors,
shapes and overall design. The scoring criteria for the coat of arms will include
the following factors: Clarity; Content; Creativity; Design; and Synthesis (how it all
fits together).
2nd Assignment: Write an expository essay of 250-400 words
(one or two type-written pages) on the topic:
"Chivalry in Narnia: An Honorable Code for Today"
Chivalry is the code of honor which was adopted by the medieval knights. It included these
virtues: faith in God; reverence for the church & sacred things; courage in battle;
humility about oneself; protection of women; defense of the poor & the weak; and
chastity (abstinence from lust and sex outside of marriage). C.S. Lewis believed that this
code of honor was an enduring and worthy code of life for all ages. Narnia overflows with
chivalry. Aslan Himself confers knighthood upon Peter and Edmund in LWW, and upon Caspian
(through King Peter) in PC. There are numerous references to chivalric virtues, deeds and
activities throughout the Chronicles. Perhaps the most outstanding example of chivalry
created by Lewis is Reepicheep, referred to as "the most valiant" of all the
Talking Beasts in Narnia.
The purpose of this essay to find your own favorite examples of chivalry in one or more of
the seven Chronicles, and to explain how those examples provide a relevant way of life for
us today. In his book Dating, Intimacy & the Teenage Years Dr. Karl Duff does
exactly this kind of thing. He doesn’t refer to Narnia, but he does show how the
chivalric code applies to life today. Here’s an example: "Men were designed by
God to protect women physically, economically, and emotionally. Sex outside marriage
provides none of these… Girls, listen! … Male love is proven when the man
protects you!" (p. 70). You don’t have to be as specific as Dr. Duff, but
you should try to think of ways in which the code of chivalry could help our society
today.
An expository essay is a style of writing which explains something.
Expository writing is the kind of writing which you find in most magazines, newspapers,
and owner’s manuals. Assume that your reader is not familiar with chivalry or with
the Chronicles of Narnia. Give some examples of chivalry from the Chronicles, and then
explain how those examples show a code of behavior which is needed in our world today.
3rd Assignment: Take an exam on Mere Christianity
The exam will be a Multiple Choice and Short Answer Exam sent to the students via email.
It will either be given during the last class session before the Midwinter Break, or given
as a "Take-Home Exam." It will be based upon the weekly reading quizzes and
class discussion about Mere Christianity during the previous weeks.
4th Assignment: Write a book review on The Great Divorce
(250-400 words = one or two type-written pages)
A book report is completely factual. It includes information on the author,
title, place and year of publication as well as a summary of the content of the book. A
book review, on the other hand, is much more personal. It is really an
expression of the reader's opinion of the work, or of specific aspects of the work. Here
are some guidelines:
Guidelines for Writing a Book Review on Fiction:
You have read your book. Your next step will be to organize what you are
going to say about it in your report. Writing the main points in an outline will help you
to organize your thoughts. What will you include in the outline? Start with a description
of the book. The description should include such elements as:
1. The setting--where does the story take place? Is it a real place or an imaginary
one? If the author does not tell you exactly where the story is set, what can you tell
about it from the way it is described?
2. The time period--is the story set in the present day or in an earlier time
period? Perhaps it is even set in the future! Let your reader know.
3. The main character(s)--who is the story mostly about? Give a
brief description. Often, one character can be singled out as the main character, but some
books will have more than one. When there are several main characters, you are free to
focus on one which is of particular interest to you.
4. The plot--what happens to the main character? WARNING! Be
careful here. Do not fall into the boring trap of reporting every single thing that
happens in the story. Pick only the most important events. Here are some hints on how to
do that. First, explain the situation of the main character as the story opens. Next,
identify the basic plot element of the story--is the main character trying to achieve
something or overcome a particular problem? Thirdly, describe a few of the more important
things that happen to the main character as he/she works toward that goal or solution.
Finally, you might hint at the story's conclusion without completely giving away the
ending.
5. The conclusion-- The four points above deal with the report aspect of
your work. For the final section of your outline, give your reader a sense of the
impression the book made upon you. Ask yourself what the author was trying to achieve and
whether or not he achieved it with you. What larger idea does the story illustrate? How
does it do that? How did you feel about the author's style of writing, the setting, or the
mood of the novel. You do not have to limit yourself to these areas. Pick something which
caught your attention, and let your reader know your personal response to whatever it was.
Adapted from the Lakewood Public Library Online: Lakewood, Ohio: http://www.lkwdpl.org/
Introduction to C.S. Lewis
N.J.Lund
Imagine having “Clive” as your first name and
“Staples” as your middle name. C.S.
Lewis didn’t like it any better than you would. His
friends called him “Jack.” He was
born in Belfast, Ireland on Nov. 29, 1898. He
died 65 years later on November 22, 1963—the same day President John F. Kennedy was
assassinated.
As early as six years of age Jack experienced something which
eventually led him to Jesus. He later called
it Sehnsucht, a deep longing for something unknown, an unknown country, an unknown joy. For the next twenty-five years (until he was 31)
Lewis tried to satisfy that deep longing—and failed.
When his mother died of cancer he was only ten. His father sent Jack and his older brother away to
a strict boarding school. Jack was angry at
God and had no interest in prayer after his mother died.
In fact, he said, I found within myself a “deep seated wish that God
didn’t exist,” a wish to be left alone (Nicholi, 46). I had about as much interest in searching for God
as a mouse has in searching for the cut! (Images, 20).
“I had as little wish to be in the church as (an animal) in the
zoo” (Nicholi, 81).
As he grew older, Jack’s atheism increased. When he was fifteen a friend asked him what he
thought about God. Lewis wrote back and
ridiculed his friend for caring about such a silly superstition. “Religion is nothing more than an
invention,” Lewis said. “Primitives
made up religion out of their ignorant fears of thunder and such things (Images, p. 16).
As a student at Oxford University, Lewis quickly distinguished
himself as a brilliant scholar. He won what is
called a “triple first,” the highest honors in three academic fields—in
addition to other honors and prizes. After a
year tutoring at University College, Lewis was elected to a full-time position at Magdalen
College, Oxford, in 1925. Lewis was surprised
to discover that his favorite colleagues at Oxford turned out to be Christians. One of those Christians was J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien not only became one of Jack’s best
friends, but his influence helped Lewis to become a Christian.
There were other influences too, like reading the works of George
MacDonald and G.K. Chesterton. But in a letter
to his friend Arthur Greeves, Lewis wrote that “the immediate human causes of my
conversion” were the friendship and testimony of his Christian colleagues at Oxford,
Hugo Dyson and J.R.R. Tolkien. (Nicholi, 91).
Lewis later said that reading George MacDonald “baptized my
imagination,” and reading G. K. Chesterton helped me to accept “the
Incarnation”—the belief that the God who makes men Himself became a man
(Nicholi, 83,89). But it was in the friendship
of Tolkien which led Lewis to put his trust in Christ.
On a September evening in 1931 Lewis invited Dyson and Tolkien to dinner. After dinner they strolled through the gardens of Oxford,
talking late into the night. Tolkien
didn’t excuse himself until 3:00 in the morning.
12 days later Lewis told his friend: “I have just passed on…to definitely
believing in Christ…My long night talk with Dyson and Tolkien had a good deal to do
with it.” And later Lewis wrote:
“Dyson and Tolkien were the immediate human causes of my conversion” (Nicholi,
91).
Lewis compared his conversion to waking up from a sleep, “a long
sleep” (Nicholi, 92). He became aware
that his blindness to God had been a “willful blindness” (Nicholi, 91). He had resisted God because he wanted to be his own
lord. But he also realized that Jesus was the
deepest Joy for which he had been longing since he was a boy. After his surrender to Christ he experienced a
peace and delight he had never known before. He
told a friend that the skies seemed bluer and the grass seemed greener and he said:
“Everything seems to be beginning again” (Images, 22).
Lewis went on to become the greatest defender of the Christian faith
in the 20th century. In a cover
article in Time magazine in September 8, 1947, Lewis was described as the most influential
spokesperson for the spiritual worldview in the world.
In addition to his distinguished career teaching at Oxford (1924-1954) and Cambridge
(1955-1963), and writing professionally, Lewis also wrote dozens of books and essays,
works both of fiction and non-fiction, presenting and defending a Biblical worldview. His ideas continue to arouse and capture the hearts
and minds of millions. For 25 years the most
popular course at Harvard University has been a course by Dr. Armand Nicholi comparing the atheistic viewpoint of
Sigmund Freud with the Christian worldview of C. S. Lewis.
Lewis believed that we are strangers and aliens in this world and that our
true country is Heaven: “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this
world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another
world” (Mere Christianity 3.10).
The Lions of Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square is London’s most famous square, sitting in the heart of the city at
the intersection of four famous roads. It was
built from 1829-1841 to commemorate England’s naval victory over Napoleon in 1805
under the command of Admiral Lord Nelson. Four
huge bronze lions were added to the base of Lord Nelson’s column by Edwin Landseer, a
famous artist, in 1868. The faces of the lions
are majestic and grand. C.S. Lewis rooted his
image of Aslan in the Trafalgar lions in this passage from Chapter 2 of The Silver Chair,
“Jill Is Given a Task,” where Jill meets Aslan for the first time: “… just this side of the stream lay the
lion. It lay with its head raised and its two
forepaws out in front of it, like the lions in Trafalgar Square” (p. 19).
Trafalgar Lion Picture Links
on the Internet
http://www.danheller.com/london-trafalgar.html
http://imagesoftheworld.org/london/page0001.html
http://imagesoftheworld.org/london/024_21.JPG
http://home.earthlink.net/~jehdjh/fampics/Jtraf1.jpg
http://www.saveourscreen.com/TNV/Europe/London_Trafalgar/London%20SS1.htm
