The Inklings discussion
Favorite NON-Lewis/Tolkien Inkling...
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Hmm.Perhaps we should pick an Inkling we haven't read and broaden our horizons. As for myself, I will try Owen Barfield.
Charles Williams is becoming my favorite. His stories are fiction mixed with dreamlike fantasy. Oh please do read something of his, so I can discuss one of his books with someone. After you read one, you want to talk about it and get others insights. I posted the one I read on the groups bookshelf somewhere. At the moment the name slips me.
Bob,All Hallows Eve was the Charles Williams book I read and enjoyed.
Mod
Hi Kham,All Hallows Eve seemed to deal more with life after death, a part of religion, but not unlike how Tolkien has his Elves going to the West. There is no direct didactic quality about it. It does have a type of "purgatory" in it, which made me think about how I live and am I living selfishly or caring about my fellow man.
I may try the Humphrey Carpenter book. What's the title?
I love Tolkien's theme of friendship in the "Lord of the Ring Series." Everyone needs a Sam, or needs to be a Sam for another.
Kham,Well I looked up the Humphrey Carpenter book myself and added it to my "to read " list. I know my hubby would also like that book. However I have a lot of other books that friends want me to read first! I have a de ja vous feeling like I read something of his before?
Mod
The Inklings book is a bit hard to find, probably unlikely you read it before. But definitely worth getting if you REALLY are interested in a bunch of old English scholars hashing it out in college basements. I am!
Kham, Oh Me too! Me too!!!!My husband, our teens and so many of our friends do that very thing, only we discuss all that inkling type of talk around our dining room table. I just think their friendship was such a beautiful thing. I know when Lewis' wife Joy died he went through so much, and his inkling friends were there for him, even when he tried to isolate himself. Some of them were WW1 vets. They were a generation that did so much, like the WW2 generation. Oh if we could just learn from them.
My favourite is Charles Williams, and of his books I like The place of the lion, The greater trumps and War in heaven best. If you haven't read any of his books I recommend starting with War in heaven
Mod
Hi Steve,I really liked Charles William, "All Hallows Eve." I enjoy reading the Inklings that bring faith in God into their stories in some really different ways.
If I had to pick a non-Tolkien/Lewis Inkling, I'd definitely go with Barfield. I have a lot of his books and find him very interesting (in the sense of "I think maybe my brain will explode now", at times). I don't always *agree* with him, mind you -- or rather, there'll usually be a point in his argument at which we diverge. But it's always stimulating!Recommended: Poetic Diction, Saving the Appearances, the essay "Poetic Diction and Legal Fiction" (which is in the Essays Presented to Charles Williams among other places), History in English Words, and for the digest-sized version of Barfield's thought, Speaker's Meaning.
Margaret wrote: "If I had to pick a non-Tolkien/Lewis Inkling, I'd definitely go with Barfield. I have a lot of his books and find him very interesting (in the sense of "I think maybe my brain will explode now", a..."The only Barfield book I've read is History in English words.
That's probably his most accessible work (with the possible exception of his fiction, which I've never run across a copy of -- though I've heard of it).
Kham wrote: "Karen,The Inklings book is a bit hard to find, probably unlikely you read it before. But definitely worth getting if you REALLY are interested in a bunch of old English scholars hashing it out in ..."
I've read it a couple of times, and also Carpenter's biography of Tolkien. I like the idea of the Inklings -- the kind of literary discussions they had,m and reading their work to each other.
On the subject of the Inklings as a group, I would also strongly recommend Diana Pavlac Glyer's recent book, The Company They Keep .
Mod
Thanks--I'm going to add that to my list
Margaret wrote: "On the subject of the Inklings as a group, I would also strongly recommend Diana Pavlac Glyer's recent book, The Company They Keep ."I've added it to my to-read list. I wonder if she was any relation of Ross Pavlac, alias the Avenging Aaardvark, whose web pages had several interesting articles about the Inklings.
I wouldn't be at all surprised. I do know she's married to another well-known fan, Mike Glyer.
My favorite Inkling overall is Charles Williams.
Margaret wrote: "If I had to pick a non-Tolkien/Lewis Inkling, I'd definitely go with Barfield. I have a lot of his books and find him very interesting (in the sense of "I think maybe my brain will explode now", a..."Margaret, you are the only person in the world other than my brother John who has mentioned Barfield's Poetic Diction in my hearing. He gave me a copy of it, and it is indeed an interesting and challenging book.
Rtaylor32 wrote: "My favorite Inkling overall is Charles Williams. "Charles Williams would be my favorite, too, along with Dorothy Sayers, if she had been allowed in.
My favorite Inkling work, after Lewis and Tolkien's stuff (or perhaps on par with it) is All Hallows Eve by Charles Williams.
Laurele wrote: "Rtaylor32 wrote: "My favorite Inkling overall is Charles Williams. "Charles Williams would be my favorite, too, along with Dorothy Sayers, if she had been allowed in."
I love Dorthy Sayers notes on the Divine Comedy. I believe she dedicated her translation to Williams.
Rtaylor32 wrote: I love Dorthy Sayers notes on the Divine Comedy. I believe she dedicated her translation to Williams.Yes. Dorothy has taken me through the Divine Comedy twice. She knew just what Dante was talking about.
hi all, I would like to read some of Roger Lancelyn Green's own tales, but I see it very hard to find... anybody has some? or some suggestions?
I like biographies so I would probably go with David Cecil. I have read little by "other inklings" but if the question were which do you like the most, my answer would be Warren Lewis. It is said that he was the consummate gentleman and I like that. Barfield's metaphysical stuff is a bit odd. And Williams was genuinely creepy (read the new book The Fellowship.)
Marian, Regarding Green: I am a bookseller specializing in the Inklings. I am home now but I am pretty sure my next Inklings catalog (November) includes a title by Green but I cannot recall what it is. I will keep you posted.
Stan wrote: "Marian, Regarding Green: I am a bookseller specializing in the Inklings. I am home now but I am pretty sure my next Inklings catalog (November) includes a title by Green but I cannot recall what it..."
Greetings. If you have a physical catalog, is there a way to sign up for it?
Greetings. If you have a physical catalog, is there a way to sign up for it?
I wish it was physical but it is just an ecatalog. If you would like to get it send me your email address.Stan
It'd be Williams for me (though I've been shaken by things I have learned about the man since publication of Letters to Lalage, etc.). The Place of the Lion could be a good one to start with, especially, ESPECIALLY if you love Chesterton's wonderful The Man Who Was Thursday. A darker, deeper novel is All Hallows' Eve, which others have recommended.But I've found Barfield rewarding, too (and wrote about him for Touchstone magazine some years ago). I suggest History, Guilt, and Habit as a first book by him.
I've read Warnie Lewis's diary as published as Brothers and Friends a couple of times with much enjoyment, and also found his book The Splendid Century a good read. Don King, who edited Lewis's poems -- his edition is the one to get -- is working on a biography of Warren, and I await it eagerly.
There's also the writers who are in the penumbra of the Inklings -- they weren't Inklings, but were friends with one or more of the Inklings and close to them in spirit. RUTH PITTER. Even if you think you don't find poetry interesting, you should give her a try. Start by looking up Lewis's letters to her in the second and third volumes of his Collected Letters. Then get hold of an edition of her poems. Don King released what I'm sure is the best version this year, but you can go with the Enitharmon paperback that's less expensive. Then look up the poems there from The Ermine, for example. I'm a huge fan of Ruth Pitter. She is a fine, traditional poet of the spirit, of nature, of the Christian faith (eventually).
I also recommend that you look into the poetry of Martyn Skinner, notably Letters to Malaya (three volumes, somewhat confusingly presented as Letters I-V) and The Return of Arthur. He was an acquaintance of Lewis's. Lewis recommended that Skinner take up Merlin coming to the modern age. Skinner is witty and readable.
Dale Nelson
I am not widely read in the "other inklings" but J. A. W. Bennett wrote something I really like. He was an Inkling who took Lewis' chair at Cambridge after Lewis's death. Benneitt's inaugural speech was published as a pamphlet called The Humane Medievalist in 1964 and it is marvelous.Stan Shelley
Stan wrote: "I am not widely read in the "other inklings" but J. A. W. Bennett wrote something I really like. He was an Inkling who took Lewis' chair at Cambridge after Lewis's death. Benneitt's inaugural speec..."I hope to read this very soon. Thanks for the tip.
Marian wrote: "hi all, I would like to read some of Roger Lancelyn Green's own tales, but I see it very hard to find... anybody has some? or some suggestions?"One of RLG's stories was issued in paperback, in the old Ballantine Books Fantasy series edited by Lin Carter. The Ballantine volume is called Double Phoenix. I have owned a copy for many years but not yet read it.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6...
Dale Nelson
Dale wrote: "Marian wrote: "hi all, I would like to read some of Roger Lancelyn Green's own tales, but I see it very hard to find... anybody has some? or some suggestions?"One of RLG's stories was issued in p..."
Hi Dale,
I have bought Double Phoenix from Amazon some time ago, and have read Green's "From the World's End" already. It is quite interesting - about a man reinventing his old and abandoned family country house... Remarkably, I've found out that his family actually owned a large residence, so it might be quite autobiographical ;)
The only inklings I'm really very familiar with are Lewis and Tolkien, but I do mean to read Charles Williams and R L Green and have already started on Dorothy Sayers (not technically an Inkling, I think, but very closely associated.) But my favourite Lewis and Tolkien influence is probably the most obvious one too-George MacDonald, to whom I was predisposed from the beginning being a North East Scot like himself. On that note, anyone who would like to check out my new Scots/English translation of his classic novel Sir Gibbie (one of Lewis's favourites among the "realistic" works) which has now made the book accessible for the first time (in unabridged form) to non-Scots-speakers, and is endorsed by Lewis's stepson Douglas Gresham and Inklings authority Diana Glyer, see the link here: http://www.worksofmacdonald.com/produ... and the video endorsement from Doug himself:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYZ19...
I've heard Charles Williams is good, though I've yet to read him myself. If we're talking Inklings and influences rather than just strictly the Inklings themselves, then I strongly recommend George MacDonald. See my post above for a link to my illustrated edition of his novel Sir Gibbie, which Lewis mentions in his MacDonald anthology. Some of the other standout MacDonald works are Phantastes, The Golden Key and The Princess and the Goblin (and sequel.) These latter two are mentioned in Lewis's That Hideous Strength.
And welcome to the group, 305writers_lane!
The Gospel in Dorothy L. Sayers: Selections from Her Novels, Plays, Letters, and EssaysI'd have to say Dorothy Sayers, who had the Inklings sense of humor and joy in life. I've just put together an anthology of her work. If you know her fiction, this is a great introduction to her poems, essays and plays.
305writers_lane wrote: "Hi, I’m new to this group. I am a big C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien fan, but I haven’t read any of the other Inklings’ works. Does anyone have recommendations? Thanks."Here's a good guide to the works of Charles Williams: Reader’s Guide | The Oddest Inkling.
WB Yeats. Of all the poets in my required lit classes he is the only one who ever captured my interest. I was a science major & had little appreciation of the power of the well chosen word back then. To my everlasting loss.
Donna wrote: "WB Yeats. Of all the poets in my required lit classes he is the only one who ever captured my interest.Does he have an Inklings connection, though?
Who is your favorite Inkling author (besides the two mentioned above) and which book of theirs do you recommend reading?
Hopefully this will give us all some new places to travel in our reading...