C. S. Lewis misquotes

“Do not dare not to dare.” (In which Lewis did write but did not mean what we probably thought he meant.)

ckirgiss5 Comments

“Do not dare not to dare.”

This favorite Lewis quote shows up all over the worldwidespiderwebthatensnares.

Google search it and you will freely receive almost half-a-billion hits. If you can’t trust that, what can you trust?

But here’s the thing. If you read this quote as a self-standing phrase, you’ll likely get it wrong. By itself, it sounds like, “Whatever it is that you want to do, whatever adventure it is that you want to pursue, whatever big thing it is that is dangling in front of your eyes – perhaps surrounded by crowds and acclaim, fame and fortune – then for goodness sake just go do it. I dare you! I dare you to not do it! Do not dare not to dare! Or some such thing. Indeed

Glory be, this is Lewis at his how-we-like-and-imagine-him finest, encouraging us to be Amazing People Who Do Amazing Things (And Hopefully Probably Get Noticed In The Doing).

Or not.

This real quote is from The Horse and His Boy. The setting: Aravis (human), Shasta (human), Hwin (horse), and Bree (horse) had just recently arrived at the Hermit of the Southern March’s humble dwelling after a long and dangerous journey. Just prior to arriving, Shasta had done both the bravest and most frightening thing of his life. Like his companions, he looked forward to a long rest. But instead, he was immediately sent on another dangerous and difficult quest.

“Shasta’s heart fainted […] for he felt he had no strength left. And he writhed inside at what seemed the cruelty and unfairness of the demand. He had not yet learned that if you do one good deed your reward usually is to be set to do another and harder and better one.”

His new task? To go alone in pursuit of a King he’d never met, who lived in a place he’d never been, travelling through a land he’d never visited, to deliver a message he didn’t understand. And because of the urgent circumstances, he must run. Always run, and never walk. Woohoo. The stuff of fame and fortune.

Meanwhile, back at the Hermit’s habitat, Aravis, Hwin, and Bree rested from their exhausting journey. They began discussing Aslan – primarily who and what he is.

Aravis: Bree, why do you keep swearing By the Lion and By the Lion’s Mane? I thought you hated lions.

Bree: So I do. But when I speak of the Lion of course I mean Aslan, the great deliverer of Narnia who drove away the Witch and the Winter. All Narnions swear by him.

Aravis: But is he a lion?

Bree (in a shocked voice): No, no of course not.

Aravis: All the stories about him in Tashbban say he is. And if he isn’t a lion why do you call him a lion?

Bree (in a rather superior tone with his eyes half shut): Well, you’d hardly understand that at your age.

[And then a lion, the Lion, who is in fact 100% LION, approached from behind so that Aravis and Hwin saw him, but Bree did not.]

Bree (still in a rather superior tone with his eyes half shut): Even a little girl like you, Aravis, must see that it would be quite absurd to suppose he is a real lion. Indeed it would be disrespectful. It he was a lion he’d have to be a Beast just like the rest of us. Why! (and here Bree began to laugh) If he was a lion he’d have four paws, and a tail, and Whiskers!….Aie, ooh, hoo-hoo! Help!

You can guess what had happened. The Lion, the Only Lion, the One True Lion, approached the group, and the Lion’s very real whiskers brushed against Bree’s very real ear, and all of Bree’s puffed up worldly wisdom was shot to pieces as he shot like an arrow to the other side of the enclosure, unable to escape the horror behind him.

Hwin, who’d always been the wisest and bravest of them all, “though shaking all over, gave a strange little neigh and trotted across tO the Lion.”

Hwin: Please, you’re so beautiful. You may eat me if you like. I’d sooner be eaten by you than fed by anyone else.

Aslan (planting a lion’s kiss on her twitching, velvet nose): Dearest daughter. I knew you would not be long in coming to me. Joy shall be yours.

And then Aslan said this – and pay close attention because here comes the Dashing Adventurous Big Amazing quote.

Aslan (in a louder voice): Now, Bree, you poor, proud, frightened Horse, draw near. Nearer still, my son. Do not dare not to dare. Touch me. Smell me. Here are my paws, here is my tail, these are my whiskers. I am a true Beast.

Bree (in a shaken voice): Aslan, I’m afraid I must be rather a fool.

Aslan: Happy the Horse who knows that while he is still young.

Did you catch that? Did you see what Lewis did there? He flipped “do not dare not to dare” on its everloving self-focused big-and-amazing-things head.

Do not dare not to dare:

  • to draw near to Christ
  • to see him as he truly is – the True King incarnate
  • to shed one’s foolish fears
  • to shed one’s foolish pride
  • to cast aside one’s foolish notions that are based on rubbishy blather
  • to deny oneself so that the Creator can refashion you into your true self
  • to be undone by the Lord’s almighty presence
  • to be embraced by the Lord’s patient and faithful love.

There is nothing “me” about this quote. There is nothing particularly “dashing and daring” about this quote.

Mostly, there is repentance, surrender, humility, trust, and obedience.

Which makes it, in fact, quite a stunning truth for all to consider.

Isn’t it interesting how even when we quote Lewis correctly, we are quick to make it mean what we want it to mean? Human nature is so very predictable that way.

C. S. Lewis (not) on the Coronavirus

ckirgiss1 Comment

For almost a week, friends have been sending me emails and texts about this blog post (“C. S. Lewis on the Coronavirus”) asking if it is in fact genuinely Lewisian. Are these the words of Clive? The truths of Jack? During this time of COVID19 lockdowns and social distancing, does Lewis really want me to not only pray, read, and listen to music but to also chat with my friends over a pint and a game of darts in the local pub or tavern where presumably there are many other people for whom social distancing is a thing to be eschewed by smart folk who smirk?

They ask me this, I presume, because I get mighty curmudgeonly about the glut of Lewis misquotes in print, digital, and spoken discourse (see here and here and here for starters) as well as the egregiously errant mis-numbering of the Narnian books – but I digress).

In answer to my friends’ questions: Yes. Lewis did write the three paragraphs quoted in the blog post. And thirteen subsequent paragraphs, which are definitely not about the Coronavirus (not even obliquely) and not even about the atomic bomb (primarily). Instead they are about acknowledging and admitting (being “waked” as Lewis put it, which I suppose is akin to being “woke” in this, our superlatively advanced and intellectually brilliant 21st-century)

“that the important question is not whether an atomic bomb is going to obliterate ‘civilization’. The important question is whether ‘Nature’ — the thing studied by the sciences – is the only thing in existence.” (“On Living in an Atomic Age,” Informed Reading, vol. VI [1948], pp 78-84, par. 7)

Lewis wrote this essay in 1948, when the possibility of a civilization-obliterating atomic bomb was a very real thing, and when most Europeans, including Lewis, were living not just under but within and among the realities of a gruesome war that often pounded on their backdoor.

In other words, Lewis wrote this essay under circumstances that were entirely unlike those in most of today’s world, especially America, and were absolutely unlike our current battle (skirmish? combat? struggle?) with covid19.

We have been asked to wash our hands scrupulously. To not stockpile more than we need. To avoid unnecessary travel. To stay home if possible, as much as possible. And for certain to avoid such things such as crowded (or even under-crowded) taverns and pubs where one might be “chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts.” (par. 3)

Certainly do read Lewis’s full essay since true meaning is most assuredly found in full reading. And certainly do take the time to discern if there are relevant ideas and concepts worth pondering (e.g. the limitations of naturalism, the existence of a Creator, the true essence and meaning of life).

But as you read, contextualize wisely. Do not pluck a Lewis quote – even a real one – out of context in order to either satisfy yourself or to be smirkingly provocative (which is not what the referenced blog’s author seemed to be doing, but is certainly what some re-posters are doing).

Lewis played by the rules – whether he was teaching, tutoring, soldiering, rationing, caring for sick and elderly, or quarantining himself during illness. His letters reveal a man who, for all of his worldly renown, did not presume to knock aside the rules or guidelines delivered by those in authority, which isn’t to say he didn’t grumble or grouse about them if he was having a grouchy day or if the occasion warranted.

To those who have read just three paragraphs of Lewis’s 1948 essay addressing the very real fear of atomic annihilation and see within it Lewisian approval to toss aside what may feel like unnecessary and life-squelching limits on certain types of social interaction, I get it. No one likes to be told what to do. And maybe in months or years, the telling will turn out to have been overly reactionary and unnecessary.

But unless the telling defies the laws of decency or requires one to deny Christ, we would all do well to pay attention.

We would also do well to pay attention to Lewis’s underlying and ultimate messages in the essay.

Be sensible: do the necessary daily work (such as bathing babies) as though they matter and have value, which they do.

Be joyful: read books, listen to music, chat with friends as though such things matter to our souls, which they do.

Be thoughtful: consider how the deeper truths of life, the supernatural world, and the Divine inform and intersect with our very existence, which they do.

Be Christlike: sacrifice humbly, love deeply, embrace the here-and-now earthly things that embody this present life, but pursue the now-and-not-yet heavenly things that point towards and reflect the only Real & Lasting Life itself, which they do.

Postscript: And if the current events provide occasion to read (joy!), and if you should choose to read the Chronicles of Narnia (joy, indeed!), then be literarily and Lewisianly orthodox: read them in the order the books themselves propound and the author himself planned:

  1. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
  2. Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia
  3. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
  4. The Silver Chair
  5. The Horse and His Boy
  6. The Magician’s Nephew
  7. The Last Battle
Frontmatter of The World’s Last Night, collected essays of C. S. Lewis, 1960.
Published while Lewis lived, indicating the original and intended order of the Narnian books.

“May the real me meet the real you” – in which Lewis is again attached to blather

ckirgiss3 Comments

C. S. Lewis
Lewis in his especially dapper spectacles

(It is the 55th anniversary of C. S. Lewis’s death today. I will celebrate with turkey, stuffing, pie, and an earnest attempt to recover yet another Lewisian quote from its tangled and tortured digital revision.)

Most Lewis misquotes are multiplicitous, appearing hither and yon throughout the interwebbed cosmos. Some of the internet’s favorite snips of non-Lewisian blather are:

“You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” (Gah.)

“True humility is not thinking of yourself less; it is thinking less of yourself.” (Ack.)

“You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.” (Meh.)

Anyone who has ever read Lewis seriously will recognize these phrases as thoroughly non-Lewisian. The thought of him speaking or writing any of these vapid platitudes is ludicrous. Lamentable, even.

But I was recently sent a Lewis misquote that I’d not seen before. The subject line of the email read:

Did CS Lewis say “May the real me meet the real you”

The appalling grammar was proof enough of misquotation. (Grammar isn’t a mystery. Break the sentence down to its simplest elements: “May me meet you.” Indeed. Cough.) A quick web search showed the fuller misquote to be as follows: “The prayer that precedes all prayers is may the real me meet the real you.” The appalling punctuation was additional proof of misquotation. (Where does the quote within the quote begin and end?) But it provided enough context for me to consult a real book, written by the real Lewis, that sits upon a real shelf in my real office, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer.

After a frenzied textual search, I began typing my response, with gusto, while gritting my teeth:

Did CS Lewis say this? Absolutely not. It doesn’t sound even remotely like him. It’s trite syrup that drips of 21st-century populist-speaker-writer-religion centered around supernaturally vulnerable friendships. Ack.

It is similar to something Lewis actually wrote in Letters to Malcolm. The social media misquote makes it sound as though Lewis is concerned with people being completely open and honest with each other – no masks, no false selves, no posturing, no faking, blah blah blah.

But the original quote – the real quote – is concerned with the fact that in prayer, we are trying to place ourselves in the very presence of God, while also existing amongst earthly realities (i.e. four walls of the room in which we sit, our own physical self, our feeble attempts at introspection) that are both “real” but also very far from being ‘rock-bottom realities’. Until we realize and even experience that truth, our prayers are mere chatter that often entirely miss the actual intersection of Creator and created.

The real quote appears in letter XV, which deals with such things as dramatic constructions of realities, questions of ontology, the façade of consciousness, the confrontation of subject and object, and surprising theophany. You can find it in the final paragraph. It reads thus, with the prefacing context:

“The attempt is not to escape from space and time and from my creaturely situation as a subject facing objects. It is more modest: to re-awake the awareness of that situation. If that can be done, there is no need to go anywhere else. This situation itself is, at every moment, a possible theophany. Here is the holy ground; the Bush is burning now.

“Of course this attempt may be attended with almost every degree of success or failure. The prayer preceding all prayers is, ‘May it be the real I who speaks. May it be the real Thou that I speak to.’ Infinitely various are the levels from which we pray. Emotional intensity is in itself no proof of spiritual depth. If we pray in terror we shall pray earnestly; it only proves that terror is an earnest emotion. Only God Himself can let the bucket down to the depths in us. And, on the other side, He must constantly work as the iconoclast. Every idea of Him we form, He must in mercy shatter. The most blessed result of prayer would be to rise thinking, ‘But I never knew before. I never dreamed…’ I suppose it was at such a moment that Thomas Aquinas said of all his own theology, ‘It reminds me of straw.'”

– C. S. Lewis, Letters to Malcom: Chiefly on Prayer (Harcourt, 1964), pp. 81-82.

There is nothing here about masks, false identities, curated selves, vulnerable friendships, or other social-psycho-theological deconstructionist babble.

For those who care about such things, I’d suggest reading the whole of letter XV and the entire book in order to understand the full intent and to enjoy the complete discourse.

That’s usually the best way to read a nuanced text and a brainy author. Misquoted snippet phrases overlaid on angsty photos is not.

Aslan Did Not Say That (Lewis misquoted again)

ckirgiss6 Comments

[UPDATE below]

Literary Lewisians – that is, those who view his written texts and his recorded readings as the only things that qualify as Lewis quotes (as opposed to cinematic adapted one-liners and outlandish self-empowering slogans) – likely expend too much energy seething about the ever-growing corpus of non-Lewis quotes cluttering (even polluting) the digital universe.

I do, anyway.

And perhaps I should stop caring. Or stop blathering about it. Or stop calling it out.

But I think it matters immensely, far beyond anything that has to do with being a devoted Lewisian, medievalist, literarian, or would-be-Narnian. (For these reasons and these. Also these and these. And so many more.)

This is not merely about misquotes. It’s about being thoughtful, careful, precise, clear. Truthful, even.

But I am once again disheartened and confounded by the most recent misquote because it is in print, in a book, about Lewis, that perhaps many people will read, and so there’s very little chance of retracting this particular absolutely-not-a-quote (just like there is very little chance of properly recovering the correct order of the Chronicles of Narnia, yet another reason literary Lewisians gnash their teeth).

The newly released book Becoming Mrs. Lewis: The Improbable Love Story of Joy Davidman and C. S. Lewis (by Patti Callahan; Thomas Nelson, 2018) ushers readers into Part I with this page:

Anyone who has read Lewis will recognize this “quote” of Aslan’s as not possibly having been written by Lewis, ever. It drips with modern self-actualization that appears nowhere in Lewis’s writings (who was thoroughly unmodern and utterly I-am-lost-without-my-Lord).

I suppose the cinematic-adapted CGI-leo might have uttered these words. But if so, the above quote should indicate such by 1) deleting C. S. Lewis as the intimated author and 2) clearly noting the cinematic-adapted-and-ravaged version as the actual source.

That seems only fair. And accurate. And clear. And precise. And factual.

I assume this “quote” comes from the cinematic-adapted scene wherein the Dawn Treader (“such a very Narnian ship”) enters the Darkness – a very real and very terrifying place of evil. A place wherein Aslan would never advise someone to defeat the darkness in oneself (which isn’t to say he denied inner darkness, or didn’t think it should be defeated). Those who know Aslan (and his earthly incarnated human-divine reality but please remember the Chronicles ARE NOT ALLEGORIES) know that when any of his children find themselves in the midst of evil danger – quivering hands, overwhelming despair, paralyzing fear – if that child has only enough strength to whisper, “Aslan, Aslan, if ever you loved us at all, send us help now,” – well, even if that child would forget to say please or pretty please or by your mane – Aslan would never respond with: “Well, hmmm, okay. But first you must defeat the darkness in yourself.”

Never. Absolutely and unequivocally never.

Instead, after pleading hopeful words in the midst of palpable despair, something would begin to change inside the child, and inside all the other children on whose behalf she also whispered.

First, a tiny speck of light would appear up ahead.

And then a broad beam of light would fall upon the ship, even while it was still surrounded by darkness.

And then along the beam, the children (some young, some grown) would see what looked like a cross, then like an aeroplane, and then like a kite before finally arriving in a whirling rush of wings. It would be an albatross. It would circle around the mast three times before perching for just an instant on the crest of the gilded dragon at the prow. And then it would spread its wings, rise, and begin to fly slowly ahead, bearing a little starboard, leading the whole shipload of children folk out into the warm and welcoming sunshine.

And the one who’d whispered for help back in the evil dark – rather than being chided for not first defeating her own inner darkness (blather) – would have heard these words from Aslan-as-albatross while still in the darkness:

 Courage, dear heart.

And as she heard the voice, she would also have felt a delicious smell breathe in her face – the breath of love, the breath of joy, the breath of presence, the breath of spirit, the breath of undeserved rescue.

And when finally out of the darkness, without knowing exactly when or how it happened, everyone would realize there was nothing to be afraid of and never had been.

That is what Aslan would have done and said – because that is what he did and said in Chapter 12 of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

So, yes – misquotes matter.

Because though both Aslan and our Lord are in the business of forming humility and love and grace in their children while also helping them die-to-self each and every day, neither Aslan nor our Lord are in the business of self-help nonsense-babble that only leads to disappointment, despair, and emptiness. (And maybe also poisonous self-inflation.)

Words matter. Because behind the words are ideas, meaning, stories, and truth. At least that’s the hope.

[UPDATE: 9 Oct 2018]

Turns out this is not just a misquote: it is a misattribution of a misquote. Aslan-of-the-screen did not say these words. Rather, Coriakin-of-the-screen did, per the Confirming C. S. Lewis Quotes page (CCSLQ) of the meticulously researched Essential C. S. Lewis site. I highly recommend it.

I don’t know if this makes things any better. Or worse. To misattribute a misquote is two too many missteps. To misattribute to a false Aslan something said by a false Coriakin is beyond reckoning. It’s Dufflepud-ish, if you will. It’s as difficult to imagine Coriakin saying these things as it is to imagine Aslan saying them.

Coriakin is, by his own estimation, the least of Aslan’s magicians. He oversees the Duffers, who would drive anyone mad. But he never once lays on them platitudes about overcoming inner darkness, pride, or stupidity. Nor does he presume to deliver supposed Aslan-esque platitudes to them regarding their petty and outlandish stubbornness, not even to the Chief Duffer, who would drive anyone sky-high-batty after just five minutes. Coriakin’s ethos and discourse runs more like this:

Lucy followed the great Lion out into the passage and at once she saw coming towards them an old man, barefoot, dressed in a red robe. His white hair was crowned with a chaplet of oak leaves, his beard fell to his girdle, and he supported himself with a curiously carved staff. When he saw Aslan he bowed low and said,

“Welcome, Sir, to the least of your houses.”

“Do  you grow weary, Coriakin, of ruling such foolish subjects as I have given you here?”

“No,” said the Magician, “they are very stupid but there is no real harm in them. I begin to grow rather fond of the creatures. Sometimes, perhaps I am a little impatient, waiting for the day when they can be governed by wisdom instead of this rough magic.”

“All in good time, Coriakin,” said Aslan.

“Yes, all in very good time, Sir,” was the answer. (Chapter 11, VDT)

Actual-Lewis’s actual-Coriakin is surely not someone who would blather about defeating inner darkness in order to defeat outer darkness. He knew better. Much better. The Chief Duffer, on the other hand…

What Lewis almost said: some thoughts on quoting carefully

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lewis-hamlet-quote
Detail of page 99, _Selected Literary Essays_, C. S. Lewis, ed. Walter Hooper. (Cambridge University Press, 1969).

I’ve ranted in the past about C. S. Lewis misquotes. So has the C.S. Lewis Foundation, Essential C. S. Lewis,  and a host of other Lewisians.

I’ve often wondered why I care about this so much, why it rankles me so deeply when someone tosses around a quote offhandedly – or heavy-handedly, as the case may be – and then takes special care to note that it is from none other than C. S. Lewis, implying that it (the quote) is nearly scriptural and therefore they (the quoters) are entirely trustworthy and authoritative.

Does it really matter?

I think so (for reasons mentioned here). I think it speaks to something about how we use language, words, and ideas, how we view authority, and how we tend to accept (often blindly) what we are offered by Those-Who-Know, whether in virtual conversations, printed text, or spoken word.

We often let others do our thinking for us. But to make it look like we’ve done our own thinking, we buttress it with a quote by Someone Really Important and Smart, like C. S. Lewis, or countless other dead people whose words have been dissected into convenient sound-bites that make us look good.

Sometimes the quote is nearly-right, as in the case of this popular one:

The next best thing to being wise oneself is to live among those who are.

This quotes gets almost 3 millions hits in a Google search. Bravo for Clive on being viral, a thousand times over.

Unlike many of Lewis’s other misattributed quotes (including: “Humility is not thinking of yourself less: it’s thinking less of yourself,” and, “You are never too old to set another goal or dream a new dream,” and, “You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.”), this one is almost spot on. What Lewis actually wrote was:

The next best thing to being wise oneself is to live in a circle of those who are: that good fortune I have enjoyed for nearly twenty years. (C. S. Lewis, “Hamlet: The Prince or the Poem?”)

If the misquoters knew that the original included “in a circle of” as opposed to “among,” I suspect they would love it even more. We are all about circles these days – circles of friends, circles of life, circles of prayer, circles of circles.

[“Circle” is a very strange word if you look at or say it over and over and over again.]

The problem with this quote being used as it so often is – i. e. to say that if one’s friends have common sense and real-world wisdom, then so will you – is that Lewis wasn’t talking about that at all (which isn’t to say he wouldn’t agree).

This quote is from one of Lewis’s literary essays, “Hamlet: The Prince or the Poem?” You can find it in at least three places: Proceedings of the British Academy (Vol. 28, 1942), They Asked for a Paper: Papers and Addresses (Geoffrey Bles, 1962) and Selected Literary Essays (ed. Walter Hooper, Cambridge University Press, 1969). It appears rather unexpectedly about two-thirds of the way into Lewis’s argument that Hamlet is best enjoyed for its poetic power and prowess rather than being critiqued along various theoretical and critical lines. He tips his hat to Owen Barfield, not for being a friend who helped Lewis navigate the difficulties of daily decision making (though perhaps he did do that) or for being a friend whose mere presence deepened and expanded Lewis’s own daily wisdom (though perhaps that did happen).

Instead, he tips his hat to Owen Barfield specifically and his other literary friends generally for being the kind of people who kept Lewis grounded as a reader and critic, for being people of deep intellect and smart ideas who challenged Lewis as a reader and critic, for being people who thought carefully and thoroughly and creatively before spouting off about nothing in particular.

For those who are interested, Lewis tends toward a reading style that embraces the poetry, the lyricism, the words, the essence, the donegality, and the visceral responses rather than a reading style that hacks and dismembers texts into lifeless blobs of intellectual blubber. Lewis believed that the many critics who had examined Hamlet’s character through every lens from every angle had missed something important. He warns that our own reading of Hamlet (should you choose to read it, which he would strongly recommend) will also miss something important if we approach it in the same clinically sterile way.

Perhaps I should rather say that it would miss as much if our behaviors when we are actually reading were not wiser than our criticism in cold blood. (“Hamlet: The Prince of the Poem?” in They Asked for a Paper, pp. 68-69; Selected Literary Essays, p. 103)

Lewis’s famous quote about wise friends is assuredly about wise friends – but not in the sense that most people use it.

And perhaps that’s not a very big deal at all. Perhaps if the quote is powerful and good and true, it has limitless applications.

But maybe it is a big deal. Maybe we need to be very careful about what we write and say and quote. Maybe knowing the context is as important as knowing the words.

If a writer doesn’t know absolutely certain where a quote is from (which includes almost every wildly popular [uncited] internet quote) but the words are good enough to stand on their own without the weight of Someone Really Important and Smart behind them, then simply say so. “As someone once said: … ”

Don’t claim the words as your own if they aren’t. At the same time, don’t attribute them to someone else if you have not checked and confirmed their source. Language is too important and powerful, too beautiful and poetic to be flung about lightly and carelessly.