XPost: alt.books.cs-lewis, rec.arts.books   
   From: hayesstw@telkomsa.net   
      
   A Statistical Look at C.S. Lewis’ Letter Writing   
   Posted on May 23, 2013	by Brenton Dickieson   
      
   Lewis at His DeskI have often heard that C.S. Lewis is one of the   
   great letter writers of history. I can hardly make any comparison; the   
   only other letter collections I have on my shelf are single volumes by   
   J.R.R. Tolkien, Dylan Thomas, and James Thurber. As I am slowly moving   
   through Walter Hooper’s impeccable 3 Volume Collected Letters of C.S.   
   Lewis (CL)–numbering 3700 pages plus introductions and biographies–I   
   am inclined to agree with the sentiment (even if I cannot verify the   
   history).   
      
   Two things I do know, though. It is probably true that Lewis is one of   
   the last great letter writers. I suspect that when some of Lewis’   
   contemporaries, like T.S. Eliot or Ernest Hemingway, have their   
   letters finally published Lewis will have met his match in sheer   
   volume. But authors who pour their wit and wisdom and literary   
   artistry–and uncounted hours–into writing letters are from a time   
   past. In his inaugural address upon receiving a professorship at   
   Cambridge (1954), Lewis called himself a dinosaur. In the art of   
   letter writing, at least, he was probably right.   
      
   If it is most likely true that Lewis is one of the last of a dying   
   breed of letter writers, it is certainly true that he came to dread   
   the task. Classically, Lewis said that   
      
       “it is an essential of the happy life that a man would have almost   
   no mail and never dread the postman’s knockâ€� (Surprised by Joy, 143).   
      
   I wrote an entire blog on Lewis’ aversion to writing the letters that   
   he felt duty-bound to write (see here), and how his growing fame meant   
   that he was constantly responding to fan letters and answering the   
   questions of inquisitive Christians. As we will see, there certainly   
   is an increase in letters as Lewis’ fame grows.   
      
   Read it all here:   
      
   http://apilgriminnarnia.com/2013/05/23/statistical-letter-writing/   
      
      
   --   
   Steve Hayes   
   Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm   
        http://www.goodreads.com/hayesstw   
        http://www.bookcrossing.com/mybookshelf/Methodius   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)