With all the books and films about CS Lewis, there are two people who were prominent in his life that get little attention.
One is the oldest son of Joy Gresham.
After Lewis married her, he took in her sons, and after her death he beame the step father to the hoys.
Douglas Gresham has written about his life with Lewis, but until now was not willing to come out and discuss the psychiatric problems of his older brother. He does mention this in a recent interview that was discussed on the blog of First Things.
While Douglas has weighed in with two books—Lenten Lands and a short biography of Lewis—David has virtually vanished from the historical record..... David died several years ago in a secure Swiss mental hospital, and Douglas has finally broken his silence about a hitherto unknown aspect of life at The Kilns. His earliest memories, he told me, were of his brother, who was later diagnosed as schizophrenic.
So Lewis had to cope with David, a trouble teenager, until his American uncle, a psychiatrist, agreed to take him in.
According to this interview, that uncle told Douglas that David was a schizophrenic: But I actually wonder if severe anger issues with acting out, complicated by being bipolar, might be the diagnosis.
Being bipolar is hereditary, and his birth father was alcoholic and abusive and probably had PTSS. This abuse is why Joy left him . But young children often don''t see such problems and often react with rage and acting out.
Douglas recounted some surreal stories. “I learned how to fight very fast; I learned how to run very fast,” he recalled. ...“It was a difficult childhood for me,” he said. “Jack tried his very hardest for David all the time. He tried to help in every way he could—he was kind and gentle and wonderful with him.”The oldest son is often the one most harmed by the loss of a parent, or because of an alcoholic/ drug abusing parent, and those of us who have had to cope with children who we adopted at an older age know about such rage, which is often directed at the non alcoholic parent (who didn't protect him) or to the new parent who is trying to rescue the damaged child and heal him. And this rage also is sometimes direced toward a sibling they see as more favored by the parent.
Other ways of coping is to essentially become the parent of the parents and siblings. Or, as seems to be the case of Douglas, to find a protecter to help them cope.
Sigh. Been there, done that.
One does hope that Douglas will write this missing chapter: Not only for CS Lewis followers, but to help those who have had to cope with similar experiences.
Headsup from TeaAtTrianon.
The other person often left out of CS Lewis' biogtaphies is the mysterious Mrs. Moore. When she is portrayed, it is usually from when she was older and slipping into the behavior problems (paranoia, rigidity) of Alzheimer's disease, and too often quote a the same descriptions of her from Lewis' brother Warnie, who moved in with them in the late 1930s, or earlier observations from upper class snobs from the university who met her but didn't get to know her, in these earlier years, and of course in a class conscious England saw her as a lower class twit.
Caring for a person with Alzheimers' is not easy, but few of Lewis' friends seem to realize how he accepted this burden. But I did read one essay of how Lewis coped with her senility, with the aid of some young helpers, during the war years. (After the war, she needed to be placed in a nursing home for proper care).
But these problems were in the l940s...
in those early years, we only see the same critical quote by the few upper class friends who criticized her because she asked Lewis to help with some of the household chores: something that was needed because he wasn't yet working.
There is a lot of speculation about if there was a sexual relationship here when he was younger and before he became a Christian. Ah, but if a lonely boy was comforted by a generous older woman, it would not prove they were evil sinners, but would point to the power of a loving woman to heal a boy damaged by a sad childhood and unfeeling father, and who was suffering from PTSS and the physical wounds of WWI.
but as one person pointed out: this was denied by Mrs. Moore's daughter, at that time a young girl, who lived with them various small rented houses (often with guests that Mrs Moore took in off the street) before Lewis' income improved and he was able to buy the Kilns.
Observations by Maureen is also essentially missing from the biographies I have read and one does wish someone would do an in depth interview with her to get insight into their relationship in the 1920s and 1930s.
But I did run across one observation of Mrs Moore in a book we remember CS Lewis: essays by his friends and students.
One of the essays was by his gardener, Fred Paxford, who is often though to be the inspiration for the character Puddleglum in the Narnia books.
Much of his essay is about the woods, fields, and lake that he cared for, and Lewis' love of nature, but he does include this about Mrs. Moore and he liked her.
She was very fond of animals and kept a few poultry which she loved to fuss with. But she always said the best place for a chicken was on the table. At best we always had a plenty of fresh eggs. She also had two dogs and two cats, always well fed. She was a great lady and very fond of Ireland and the Irish and of mothering people...She was a mother to Mr Jack (i.e. CSLewis), and he always called her Mintoes. She was always very good to me...
After describing that she bottled a lot of fruit and often gave away bottles of fruit and eggs, he mentions:
She had a kind nature. Anyone who came to the Kilns for help always went away with money, and if it was a man, with a handful of cigarettes.
presumaly this was during the depression, where some neighbors would welcome such gifts, and when wandering hobos would pass word to each other about which homes would feed them or give them a little change.
Lewis often includes his friends in his fiction: For example, Ransom in the first two books of the space trilogy is thought to be based on Tolkien (and I suspect the professor and his wife in the third book was inspired by stories of how his pupils often considered the Tolkien house as their home). And was angry Eustace of the Narnia series based on the angry stepson David? We don't know but one does wonder.
However, there are two portraits in Lewis' writings that could be inspired by Mrs. Moore.
The first was the picky lady in the Screwtape letter, who just wants toast, but is disappointed when she gets it and lets you know it.
Is this based on the Mrs Moore with early Alzheimer's disease?
But in an early book, there another fictional lady who might resemble the Mrs. Moore who invited strangers in need to stay in her home and who was always there to help the hobos and others who came to her door.
Making one wonder if her real portrait is that of the Great Lady in the Great Divorce:
True, Mrs. Moore was an atheist, not a Christian, but the warmth of her personaliy and her generosity in taking him in, and why he seemed happy to care for her for 30 years.
And only partly do I remember the unbearable beauty of her face. “Is it?...is it?” I whispered to my guide. “Not at all,” said he. “It's someone ye'll never have heard of. Her name on earth was Sarah Smith and she lived at Golders Green.” “She seems to be...well, a person of particular importance?” “Aye. She is one of the great ones. Ye have heard that fame in this country and fame on Earth are two quite different things.”...
“And who are all these young men and women on each side?” “They are her sons and daughters.” “She must have had a very large family, Sir.”
“Every young man or boy that met her became her son – even if it was only the boy that brought the meat to her back door. Every girl that met her was her daughter...“Every beast and bird that came near her had its place in her love. In her they became themselves..”
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