A Preview of the Inklings? A Note on the Early Correspondence of C. S. Lewis and Arthur Greeves

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1 A Preview of the Inklings? A Note on the Early Correspondence of C. S. Lewis and Arthur Greeves Jonathon Lookadoo I. Introduction Diana Pavlac Glyer has illustrated well how the Inklings worked together to become such a productive group of writers. 1 Meeting most actively during the 1930s and 1940s, the Inklings included writers such as C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Owen Barfield, and Charles Williams. Glyer argues that the Inklings developed a collaborative ethos by enabling members to read works-in-progress, praising high-quality work, and criticising poor elements in members writings. They also helped one another with editorial suggestions, discussed collaborative possibilities with one another, and provided models for one another s fictional characters. Many of the Inklings meetings were held in Lewis s rooms in Magdalen College, and Lewis actively participated by reading his work and interacting with papers read by other members Diana Pavlac Glyer, Joy Davidman Lewis: Author, Editor, and Collaborator, Mythlore 84 (1998), 10 17; eadem, The Company They Keep: C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien as Writers in Community (Kent: Kent State University Press, 2007); eadem, Bandersnatch: C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, and the Creative Collaboration of the Inklings (Kent: Kent State University Press, 2016). In light of the overlap between some portions of these works, citations of Glyer s publications in this article will focus on Bandersnatch, her most recent book. 2. For descriptions of Inklings meetings, see Humphrey Carpenter, The Inklings: C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, and Their Friends (London: Allen & Unwin, 1978); Philip Zaleski and Carol Zaleski, The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2015), Journal of Inklings Studies 8.2 (2018): DOI: /ink Edinburgh University Press 183

2 Journal of Inklings Studies This essay builds on Glyer s work by noting that Lewis had already engaged in many of the practices that characterised Inklings meetings in his early correspondence with Arthur Greeves. Greeves was Lewis s neighbour in Belfast, Ireland, and the two began exchanging letters in This note will demonstrate that Lewis and Greeves encouraged one another as writers, critiqued one another s works, offered occasional editorial assistance, and discussed collaborative work using Lewis s writing and Greeves s music. Although Lewis and Greeves corresponded until the end of Lewis s life, this study will focus on the period from 1914 to 1919, 3 that is, from the beginning of their correspondence until the immediate aftermath of Lewis s first published volume, Spirits in Bondage. 4 By showing that Greeves and Lewis engaged in several practices that Glyer highlights within the Inklings, this essay adds an early example to Glyer s already extensive documentation of such practices and suggests that Lewis began early to participate in the same type of collaborative work that would characterise his later participation in the Inklings as an Oxford don. II. Encouragement Glyer illustrates how the Inklings encouraged one another to write and employs the term resonator to depict how the Inklings amplified initial ideas to enable them to grow into full-scale projects. 5 Lewis and Greeves likewise encouraged one another as they sent their literary works to one another, often in instalments. The first work that they discussed was Lewis s Loki Bound. Lewis wrote this myth about the Norse god Loki in 1912 and 1913, but Greeves only read the manuscript in Lewis thanks Greeves for his favourable criticism after receiving his comments. 6 When Lewis struggled to begin The Quest of Bleheris, he confided his authorial difficulties to Arthur: I think Bleheris has killed my muse always rather a sickly child. 7 Lewis and Greeves created an environment in which Lewis was able to acknowledge his struggles as a writer. Lewis also sent a prose version of his Dymer myth to Greeves between January and March As Lewis was nearing the end of the story, he writes, 3. I will cite the letters according to the page numbers in Walter Hooper, The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, vol. 1 (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2004). 4. C. S. Lewis (Clive Hamilton), Spirits in Bondage: A Cycle of Lyrics (London: Heinemann, 1919). On the early reviews of Spirits in Bondage, see John Bremer, C. S. Lewis, Poetry, and the Great War (Lanham: Lexington, 2012), 93 95, although the reviews may be interpreted somewhat more positively than Bremer does. For a classic evaluation of Lewis s first volume of poetry, see George Sayer, Jack: A Life of C. S. Lewis (London: MacMillan, 1988), Glyer, Bandersnatch, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters,

3 Lookadoo, C.S. Lewis and Arthur Greeves I do hope you are really speaking the truth about Dymer in all your flattery. 8 Lewis was afraid that he would not be able to finish the story but seems to have taken some comfort from Arthur s positive response. Lewis s Dymer myth was eventually published in poetic form. 9 While this article stops its study prior to Lewis s second book, it is worth noting that Greeves s positive comments about Dymer can be found in letters ten years prior to publication. Lewis also shares his success in having his first collection of poetry accepted for publication in September In November, Lewis excitedly tells Arthur about his visit to Heinemann s in London. He describes the dream that had been realised as he sat in the sanctum of a publisher discussing my own book. 11 Although it is difficult to determine how large a role Greeves s encouragement may have played in Lewis s early writing, it is improbable that the continued correspondence with a friend about his writing had no effect. When the support that Lewis received from Greeves culminated in Spirits in Bondage, Lewis was delighted to share his success with his friend. Nor was Lewis the only beneficiary from this supportive relationship. In 1916, Greeves was beginning a work called Alice for Short. He was hesitant to share the work with Lewis, but Lewis provided encouragement in two ways. He began by urging Greeves to write: I cannot urge you too strongly to go on and write something, anything, but at any rate WRITE. 12 He continued in the same letter to ask Arthur to send him some of his writing. At the same time, Lewis put his own work down by saying that Greeves s story could not be any worse than the instalments of Bleheris that he was sending to Greeves at that time. Later in the year, Greeves was again struggling to write, and Lewis provided additional encouragement to get started with something. He also offered ideas for how to get started. He proposed that Greeves take up a tale that they had heard from a Mr Thompson or a story about the Easely family living in Ulster. 13 Lewis and Greeves encouraged each other by praising what was 8. Hooper, Collected Letters, C. S. Lewis (Clive Hamilton), Dymer (London: Dent, 1926). 10. Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, 186. Capitalisation follows the printed edition of Lewis s letters. See the similar comments in Lewis s letter of 14 June 1916: It doesn t matter what we write (at least this is my view) at our age, so long as we write continually as well as we can. I feel that every time I write a page either of prose or of verse, with real effort, even if it s thrown into the fire next minute, I am so much further on. And you too who have been so disappointed at the technical difficulties of composing, won t youfind it a relief to turn to writing where you can splash about, so to speak, as you like, and gradually get better and better by experience? ; Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters,

4 Journal of Inklings Studies valuable in their compositions, urging each other to continue writing, and creating an environment in which writing difficulties could be shared. III. Criticism Yet Lewis and Greeves did not merely admire the good things that they had written. As the Inklings would do later, 14 they also critiqued each other s writings. Although it is difficult to be certain because only one side of the correspondence has been preserved well, Lewis may have been more forthcoming with his criticism of Greeves s works. Lewis challenges Greeves s work ethic. While praising Greeves s description of a misty night, Lewis tells him that he is not as poor an artist as he leads people to believe. In fact to be honest, if you weren t lazy you could do big things. 15 Lewis also critiqued Greeves s musical and lyrical compositions. In the summer of 1919, he arranged for a song by Greeves to be sent to Mary Plowman. Lewis reports Plowman s critical comments about the song to Greeves at the beginning of his letter and encloses the full analysis. 16 He also contextualises Plowman s criticism in light of Greeves s lack of formal training in music. Lewis emphasises that the composition has merit, but he thinks that Greeves is reaching into new modes of thought and struggling to express himself in a polished manner. Greeves seems to have struggled at times to verbalise his critiques as pointedly as Lewis wanted. Thus, Lewis hopes that Greeves will always tell me the absolute truth about my work, just as if it were by someone else whom we did not know. Lewis promises to return the favour and writes that he thinks that Greeves is sometimes not candid in his comments about Lewis s writing. 17 Because Lewis writes repeatedly about his difficulties with the plot of Bleheris, 18 it is possible that Greeves wrote to Lewis about the slow pace of the narrative. Lewis urges Greeves to do his best when reading the meandering beginning. 19 Lewis later tells him that Bleheris will move from his current location in the next instalment, in case you despair of ever getting rid of the City of the Nesses. 20 Lewis did not only send narratives like Bleheris to Greeves; he also forwarded his poetry. In 1918, Lewis included a poem called Song in a letter to Greeves. 21 This poem would eventually be published in Spirits in 14. Glyer, Bandersnatch, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, , , Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters,

5 Lookadoo, C.S. Lewis and Arthur Greeves Bondage. 22 However, the poem that is included in the letter differs from the published poem. For example, Lewis wrote in 1918, How could wreathèd star on star / Dusted o er the wintry night / Fill thy spirit with delight (ll. 5 7). Yet in 1919, the poem is printed as How could wealth of star on star / Dusted o er the frosty night / Fill thy spirit with delight (ll. 5 7). Wreathèd changes to wealth of in line 5, while unity changes to frosty in line 6. Both alterations add language that is more concrete and, in the case of the first, more common. When one recalls that the poem stayed with Greeves for much of the time prior to publication, such changes raise the possibility that at least some of the alterations were made in response to Greeves s remarks on the poem. These two instances of Greeves s possible critiques of Lewis are not the most straightforward examples of criticism. Greeves s critical statements about Lewis s writings remain opaque. Two factors may account for this. First, Greeves s criticisms of Lewis must be culled from Lewis s own writings, and Lewis s responses to Greeves s comments may leave some of the critiques veiled. If Greeves s criticism of Lewis is to be found in his letters from this time, it must be found by mirror reading the letters in search of Greeves s critiques. Second, it may be that Arthur struggled to critique Lewis s writings directly. In light of Lewis s pleas to Arthur for critical feedback, the second factor seems to have played at least some role. It is probable, however, that some combination of these factors best explains the difficulty with which one now seeks Greeves s critical interactions with Lewis during this period. As Greeves collected, read, and sent Lewis s poetry to him, 23 it is likely that at least some of the changes may be due to Greeves s suggestions. Although their letters do not have the combative tone that was to be reported at some of the Inklings meetings, 24 Lewis clearly criticised Greeves and Greeves likely critiqued Lewis in their early correspondence. IV. Editorial Assistance The Inklings also aided one another with editorial help that paid attention to small matters in the manuscripts and which can be traced through the mentions 22. Lewis, Spirits in Bondage,73 74; Don W. King, The Collected Poems of C. S. Lewis: A Critical Edition (Kent: Kent State University Press, 2015), , 123 n On Greeves s work in sending Lewis his poems from Ireland, see the following paragraph. 24. For example, J. R. R. Tolkien describes a 1944 argument to his son Christopher Tolkien that took place between C. S. Lewis and Owen Barfield. The argument resulted in a most amusing and highly contentious evening in which an outsider would have thought it a meeting of fell enemies hurling deadly insults before drawing their guns ; Humphrey Carpenter, The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, edited with the assistance of Christopher Tolkien (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000),

6 Journal of Inklings Studies of other Inklings in their publications. 25 In addition to critiquing each other s works, Greeves provided Lewis with editorial assistance as Lewis sought to gather his poems into a publishable collection. While stationed in France at the end of 1917, Lewis asked Greeves to send his manuscript, The Metrical Meditations of a Cod. 26 On 2 February 1918, Lewis wrote to Greeves again and thanked him for the parcel. 27 After he returned to England, Lewis asked Greeves if he had a reddy-brown MS. book of mine containing Lullaby and several other of my later poems? 28 Lewis again requests that Greeves send the notebook to him. He also informs Greeves that he has decided to copy the poems that he likes and have them typed as he looks for a publisher. In the following month, Lewis apologises for the long interval between letters and cites his copying of the letters for the typist as an excuse. 29 Since Lewis was in the military during the time of these letters, he would not have been able to complete the manuscript without Greeves s help in sending Lewis his poems. 30 Lewis s first book of poetry would have been forced to wait until after his release from the army and may never have been released if not for Greeves. By sending the requested materials to Lewis, Greeves assisted in the publication of Spirits in Bondage in V. Collaboration Finally, Greeves and Lewis discussed collaborating with one another to compose an opera based on Lewis s Loki Bound. Such conversations fit well with the Inklings discussions of collaborative projects, few of which were actually completed. 31 The plan would have involved Lewis s writing and Greeves s music. While he was at Malvern College in 1914, Lewis encouraged 25. Glyer, Bandersnatch, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Of course, Lewis was able to write during his service, and Brian Melton helpfully describes Lewis s ability to distance himself from the war in order to focus on his writing ( The Great War and Narnia: C. S. Lewis as Soldier and Creator, in Janet Brennan Croft [ed], Baptism of Fire: The Birth of the Modern British Fantastic in World War I [Altadena: Mythopoeic Press, 2015], , pp ). However, without Greeves s assistance in sending the manuscript, Lewis would have been unable to obtain access to his manuscripts until after he was discharged. 31. Glyer, Bandersnatch, On the earliest collaboration between two Inklings members, namely, the world of Boxen that was created by C. S. Lewis and his older brother Warren, see Alister McGrath, C. S. Lewis A Life: Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House, 2013), 14, ; Zaleski and Zaleski, Fellowship, 38 41; Glyer, Bandersnatch,

7 Lookadoo, C.S. Lewis and Arthur Greeves Arthur to take the manuscript home. 32 Later in the year, Lewis wrote from Great Bookham to describe the plot of the tragic opera that he had in mind. 33 The topic was Norse, but the structure was Greek and contained a Prologos, Parodos, three episodes, and an Exodos. Having laid out the narrative skeleton, Lewis suggests that the part of Loki be sung by a tenor, Odin by a baritone, Thor by a bass, Freya by a soprano, Fassold by a bass, and the leader of the chorus by a contralto. Lewis acknowledges that the music would need to be primarily Greeves s responsibility, but he adds a few ideas of his own. While Lewis describes his writing as poor, he writes that it would not be so poor if you would set it to soul-stirring music. 34 The letter concludes with a postscript: If you begin composing in earnest, you ll find the libretto in my study upstairs. 35 As they continued to correspond about the project, Greeves suggested illustrations, and Lewis offered advice about which scenes would be best illustrated. 36 Although Lewis wrote of his hope that Loki Bound is proceeding expeditiously in music & illustration, 37 it is unclear how the project fared and it seems eventually to have fallen by the wayside. Nevertheless, this early, incomplete effort at collaboration is reminiscent of several of the Inklings projects, many of which were likewise never completed. 38 VI. Conclusion Utilising Glyer s research about the way in which the Inklings functioned as a writing group, this note has highlighted instances of similar practices in the letters of C. S. Lewis and Arthur Greeves. Glyer s accumulation of examples in which members of the Inklings provided encouragement, criticism, editorial help, and even collaboration suggest that the Inklings were a more mutually supportive and interdependent writing group than is often recognised. This essay develops Glyer s findings by arguing that Greeves and Lewis encouraged one another to write and provided a supportive relationship in which each of them could share their writing struggles. They also critiqued one another s writings, but Lewis s criticisms of Greeves are more readily available. This is likely because he was more willing to share his critiques than Greeves and because Greeves s criticisms must be mined from Lewis s letters. Greeves offered a form of editorial assistance to Lewis by responding to his requests for 32. Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, Hooper, Collected Letters, 87. The spelling and ampersand follow the printed edition of Lewis s letters. 38. On incomplete collaborations, see Glyer, Bandersnatch,

8 Journal of Inklings Studies manuscripts in 1917 and This enabled the publication of Spirits in Bondage in Finally, Lewis and Greeves discussed an early collaboration on an opera of Loki Bound, but this formal collaboration appears not to have materialised. Since similar dynamics can be found at work in both the writings of Lewis and Greeves as well as in the Inklings as described by Glyer, this essay argues that one finds a preview of the Inklings working style in the letters of Lewis and Greeves. If this is correct, such findings suggest that Lewis was strengthened by his encounters with others from the very beginning of his writing career. 190