Badger's House
I found a very good article HERE on the American side of the Lewis mythos. It's worth the time to read.
The one thing the author doesn't address explicitly, but would probably agree with, is that Lewis' work often holds great appeal because he, somehow, baptized his child-imagination, baptized it into the world of Christianity but also the world of adult reason. His children's books, like his adult books, are about ideas as much as they are about children. And frankly, most of us would rather read theology in narrative form, even child-narrative form, its breathe is so much warmer, than dry rhetoric.
I admit in my arrogant soul it used to be bother me how many adult Christians loved the Narnia books. I loved them too...when I was a ten. But there's no reason why adults shouldn't be nourished and nurtured there (and no reason why, when I have a little time, I shouldn't go back and read them myself). Yes they are books for gradeschool kids, but then Lewis was openly influenced by Kenneth Grahame's Wind in the Willows, a book I read, and loved, as an adult though it is a child's novel about home, brotherhood, the fireside conversation and the comfort of the garden gazing ball. Incidentally, this same domestic-mythos is what makes Tolkien's LOTR so irresistable: who doesn't want to live in the Shire: walks in the wood, beer from the cellar, parties and presentes, fresh food and fire, hospitality, bright waistcoats and open friendships? Who wouldn't fight, even die, for that kind of life?
(I know I 'assign' reading up here too often, but if you haven't read WITW, by all means, do. It's very lovely).
This all reminds me of something a little different. I was in college during the 80's preppie movement; I was, sadly, a sworn devotee of the upturned polo collar, friends. When the Lands' End catalogues arrived each month (free no less) I pored over them like another young man might hold pictures from home. I could feel how warm I'd be in that sweater, imagine how well-dressed, cultured and pedigreed, I'd look in that shirt. I felt secure pretending I had a past, pastoral status, money and clothes that would bring me positive attention and actual physical warmth. LE catered to the American love of the imagined country British life: they called suspenders 'braces' in the catalogue, offered sweaters from the U.K. and 'authentic' waxed cotton field coats. In short, in the 80's LE provided a homespun version of Ralph Lauren's over-priced opus. You might not be from the landed gentry, but if you wear these eight-wale moss-green trousers and this amber-heather shetland lambswool sweater vest you can pretend pretty damn well, well enough for America.
(Once in a while I still wake up at night and pray I don't end up like that catalogue-obsessed couple in the film Best of Show; for the most part my obsession is past.)
I think this anglo-love fueled the rash of 'irish' pubs in the nineties. I wanted to walk into a bar and order a pint of bitter like Ransom. But perhaps that fad has passed while I've been in the mountains. Whatever, I'll drink Guiness or Boddington's over Miller Lite any day of this life. On a darker and Lewis-connected note, it did some very strange things to Walter Hooper.
I drift.
The essential, and it's sad how I confused this, thing that Lewis (and Tolkien and Grahame) were getting at was something much more substantial than herringbone sportcoats. They were talking about domestic warmth and comfort, love of family and friends, and even God. My life has been mostly hard, but the times those things have come together I have known ecstasy.
When the cold autumn is hard in the air outside our mountain house, but inside the woodstove is thrumming light and heat off the wood floor and peaked pine ceiling, the oil lamps and candles burn throughout the room, and the warm smell of stew or bread fills the kitchen, and I come home to two loving people, or welcome them home myself...then I can know deepest satisfaction. A good I.P.A. or red wine, autumn, fresh food, warmth and light and moments of silly family closeness...there is no other. If I also allow the smallest touch of God...it is too much pleasure to feel.
That's what these authors remind us exists in the world. It's one underlying force in all these books, especially in LOTR and WITW. Simple, but acutely real, pleasures Americans are leaving behind ("yes I'd like fries with that it's okay we'll eat in the parking lot in the car Tommy turn off that game boy when you have greasy fingers hurry up drew carey is on in twenty minutes we have to get home.") In addition to domestic beauty, these authors give us wonder. The wardrobe which really does lead to another world, a world of clear good and evil no less, as in Tolkien, where I can hack orcs for a living with a clear conscience, a feat for which I feel genetically suited. These books take the fantasy we all lived in as children, part of our normal childhood development, and bring that make-believe into our adult lives. Along with it, they bring echoes of a life most of us have lost or at best have to fight for, and also, especially in Lewis and Tolkien, the God who walks with us, who eats with us, who is present in the warm slowness.
Do I have this all of the time in my own life? No. But domesticity, even hospitality, is one thing Steph and I do well. At our best, we eat and drink well and stay stovewood warm up there among the oil lamps and candles. At our very best, we bring others with us. Last Christmas we had an open house and more than twenty people came; two spiral hams, a huge pot of mulling wine, fresh rolls coming every thirty minutes out of the oven. If you are ever lost in the snow like Mole and Rat, look for a friendly door to knock on; you might find Badger's house. If I'm very lucky, you might find mine.
Drink with me now friends, the bottle stands by you: 'here's to the great things: wood that splits on the first whack, fresh rosemary, cool windy weather, stew from scratch, winter beers, wine of every color, Bowmore whiskey and Bailey's; and most of all, to my family, my wife and son, their loyalty surpasses knowledge. Also, to the Creator, who has made us a little place in the universe, here in this moment, to love without violence or fear. Cheers.'
The one thing the author doesn't address explicitly, but would probably agree with, is that Lewis' work often holds great appeal because he, somehow, baptized his child-imagination, baptized it into the world of Christianity but also the world of adult reason. His children's books, like his adult books, are about ideas as much as they are about children. And frankly, most of us would rather read theology in narrative form, even child-narrative form, its breathe is so much warmer, than dry rhetoric.
I admit in my arrogant soul it used to be bother me how many adult Christians loved the Narnia books. I loved them too...when I was a ten. But there's no reason why adults shouldn't be nourished and nurtured there (and no reason why, when I have a little time, I shouldn't go back and read them myself). Yes they are books for gradeschool kids, but then Lewis was openly influenced by Kenneth Grahame's Wind in the Willows, a book I read, and loved, as an adult though it is a child's novel about home, brotherhood, the fireside conversation and the comfort of the garden gazing ball. Incidentally, this same domestic-mythos is what makes Tolkien's LOTR so irresistable: who doesn't want to live in the Shire: walks in the wood, beer from the cellar, parties and presentes, fresh food and fire, hospitality, bright waistcoats and open friendships? Who wouldn't fight, even die, for that kind of life?
(I know I 'assign' reading up here too often, but if you haven't read WITW, by all means, do. It's very lovely).
This all reminds me of something a little different. I was in college during the 80's preppie movement; I was, sadly, a sworn devotee of the upturned polo collar, friends. When the Lands' End catalogues arrived each month (free no less) I pored over them like another young man might hold pictures from home. I could feel how warm I'd be in that sweater, imagine how well-dressed, cultured and pedigreed, I'd look in that shirt. I felt secure pretending I had a past, pastoral status, money and clothes that would bring me positive attention and actual physical warmth. LE catered to the American love of the imagined country British life: they called suspenders 'braces' in the catalogue, offered sweaters from the U.K. and 'authentic' waxed cotton field coats. In short, in the 80's LE provided a homespun version of Ralph Lauren's over-priced opus. You might not be from the landed gentry, but if you wear these eight-wale moss-green trousers and this amber-heather shetland lambswool sweater vest you can pretend pretty damn well, well enough for America.
(Once in a while I still wake up at night and pray I don't end up like that catalogue-obsessed couple in the film Best of Show; for the most part my obsession is past.)
I think this anglo-love fueled the rash of 'irish' pubs in the nineties. I wanted to walk into a bar and order a pint of bitter like Ransom. But perhaps that fad has passed while I've been in the mountains. Whatever, I'll drink Guiness or Boddington's over Miller Lite any day of this life. On a darker and Lewis-connected note, it did some very strange things to Walter Hooper.
I drift.
The essential, and it's sad how I confused this, thing that Lewis (and Tolkien and Grahame) were getting at was something much more substantial than herringbone sportcoats. They were talking about domestic warmth and comfort, love of family and friends, and even God. My life has been mostly hard, but the times those things have come together I have known ecstasy.
When the cold autumn is hard in the air outside our mountain house, but inside the woodstove is thrumming light and heat off the wood floor and peaked pine ceiling, the oil lamps and candles burn throughout the room, and the warm smell of stew or bread fills the kitchen, and I come home to two loving people, or welcome them home myself...then I can know deepest satisfaction. A good I.P.A. or red wine, autumn, fresh food, warmth and light and moments of silly family closeness...there is no other. If I also allow the smallest touch of God...it is too much pleasure to feel.
That's what these authors remind us exists in the world. It's one underlying force in all these books, especially in LOTR and WITW. Simple, but acutely real, pleasures Americans are leaving behind ("yes I'd like fries with that it's okay we'll eat in the parking lot in the car Tommy turn off that game boy when you have greasy fingers hurry up drew carey is on in twenty minutes we have to get home.") In addition to domestic beauty, these authors give us wonder. The wardrobe which really does lead to another world, a world of clear good and evil no less, as in Tolkien, where I can hack orcs for a living with a clear conscience, a feat for which I feel genetically suited. These books take the fantasy we all lived in as children, part of our normal childhood development, and bring that make-believe into our adult lives. Along with it, they bring echoes of a life most of us have lost or at best have to fight for, and also, especially in Lewis and Tolkien, the God who walks with us, who eats with us, who is present in the warm slowness.
Do I have this all of the time in my own life? No. But domesticity, even hospitality, is one thing Steph and I do well. At our best, we eat and drink well and stay stovewood warm up there among the oil lamps and candles. At our very best, we bring others with us. Last Christmas we had an open house and more than twenty people came; two spiral hams, a huge pot of mulling wine, fresh rolls coming every thirty minutes out of the oven. If you are ever lost in the snow like Mole and Rat, look for a friendly door to knock on; you might find Badger's house. If I'm very lucky, you might find mine.
Drink with me now friends, the bottle stands by you: 'here's to the great things: wood that splits on the first whack, fresh rosemary, cool windy weather, stew from scratch, winter beers, wine of every color, Bowmore whiskey and Bailey's; and most of all, to my family, my wife and son, their loyalty surpasses knowledge. Also, to the Creator, who has made us a little place in the universe, here in this moment, to love without violence or fear. Cheers.'
Comments
I'm lifted to a realization of the beautiful beyond the mundane by your words, bro. I'd like to print this one out and keep it in my wallet.
thank you so much; I don't get many comments, and this is beautiful to see.
I've been out of blogland so much lately I don't even know how to do what you're suggesting, but I'll figure it out.
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