Fiction writers create characters. By putting words on a page, the fiction writer makes these characters come alive in the imagination of readers around the world. The fiction writer also creates plots, weaving these characters together into intricate storylines that reveal the unique personality of each character, revealing and...
“Christians should thank God for J. K. Rowling and for her clear presentation of the central values that are at the core of Christian faith and practice.”
That’s not my statement, though as I’ll explain I agree with it enthusiastically. That statement comes from Jerram Barrs, in his excellent book...
Last week we looked at C. S. Lewis’ thoughts on what makes a good reader and what makes a good book. Today I want to close off that series by examining Lewis’ thoughts on fiction.
I don’t believe it’s too much to say that Lewis found fiction indispensible to his...
We all want to read good books and avoid bad ones. But how do we know the difference? C. S. Lewis helps us here.
In An Experiment in Criticism, Lewis proposes that what makes a book good or bad is the type of reading it invites. He begins by stating...
What makes a good reader? With C. S. Lewis’ help, we have already exposed “the unliterary,” “the status seeker,” and “the devotee of culture” as poor readers. But what makes a good reader?
Lewis explains that a good reader has a much different experience with a book than a poor...
Yesterday we looked at two of Lewis’ categories of poor readers: the unliterary (a broad category of those who merely use books to get at ideas) and the status seeker (who reads so he can talk about—or boast about, really—what he’s read). But Lewis’ list gets more interesting. And...
I have learned that whenever C. S. Lewis weighs in on a subject, I’d better pay attention. He’s not always right, of course, but he is always wise and thought provoking. This is true of everything that Lewis wrote on anything. But when it comes to Lewis writing about...
Last week I did a series of posts on Jesus and his church as the Light of the World. Today I want to add one final related thought. Flannery O’Connor was a brilliant fiction writer. She was also Catholic and deeply committed to Scripture. Though her fiction is often dark...
I actually hate grading papers. There, I said it. I love to read and I love to learn. But there’s just something tedious about slugging my way through a stack of papers that makes my eyes bleed—even if the papers are well-written. This is why I’ve tried to mix...
I know I’m over a decade late with this. But I recently read the first book in J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series (I plan to read them all), and I can’t help but write about it.
Harry Potter has not been well received in the Christian community as a...