The Eric Metaxas Show - Walter Hooper - Part 4 (Encore)

Episode Date: December 30, 2020

Eric's interview with Walter Hooper, the literary assistant to C.S. Lewis, continues in this special Socrates in the City broadcast recorded in London. (Encore Presentation)

This is the best of the Eric Mataxis show. It's the show everyone's talking about, but they're really sure of you listening to it. Broadcasting from the Empire State Building because the Chrysler Building wasn't available. This is the Eric Mataxis show. Your host, Eric Mataxis. Hey, I'm Eric Mataxis. Maybe you already knew that, but what you might not have known is that this week I am actually not at all in the Empire State building, not even in New York. I'm across the pond.

No, not in New Jersey. In England. Yes, I'm in Oxford, England right now, doing a special series of Socrates in the city events. That's Socrates in the city. And I wanted to share them with you, my radio audience. So now let's listen in to the Socrates in the city event I did yesterday, or it may have been the day before I'm getting confused with the jet lag. But very recently, I hope you enjoy it. Pip, pip, cheerio, and so on and so forth.

Thank you. Welcome to Socrates in the city, Oxford Edition. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. I am, thank you. I cannot tell you how excited I am about this, because for me this is a dream come true.

For years, I have wanted to interview Walter Hooper. And it's taken me this long. I apologize, Walter, but we're finally here in Oxford to do this. Walter Hooper, in case you don't know who he is, was in 1963 the secretary to C.S. Lewis. Spent time living with Lewis, working with him, and soon thereafter, when Lewis died on the same day, the same hour that President Kennedy died, Walter Hooper took on the huge, immeasurable task of doing all that needed to be done to sort of secure his literary. legacy to republish works that had fallen out of print, and really to edit his work for decades it's been now. It's just gigantic. It's a lifelong devotion. It seems to me a calling.

And for me, it's a tremendous privilege to get this time with Walter Hooper. So please, Socrates in the city, welcome for Walter Hooper. You know, if I'm pushed, I would describe myself as a mere Christian. You know, that's my denomination. And I think Lewis, helped people, in some ways, avoid the straight jacket of a particular denomination. And just to say that I'm with Lewis, I'm with historical Christianity, I'm with traditional Christianity. I think that that's something he may have intended to some extent. Do you think that that was intentional because he is so appreciated across the spectrum? Mayor Christianity is partly an answer to what are the core beliefs.

This is the main part of what Christianity is. And so far it seems to observe that purpose. And even the Catholic writers like that too. And they, I discovered, well, fairly recently in, in modern time that Pope John Paul the second liked Lewis

very early on in 1950 says his biography he was already reading with his students the screw tape letters and then in 1978

when he became Pope he mentioned in one of his sermons that the four loves, which you love, was on a level with the writings of St. Augustine. And in 1984, jumping ahead, I was invited by a priest came to Oxford to see if I would come and visit the Pope. Well, I thought this is just, I can't believe that he wants me to come and see him.

So I said, well, I'll think about it. And I thought, I just don't believe this. I don't believe that you said that. Well, he got back and he said, I realize how very busy you are, but couldn't spare five minutes with the Pope? I said, of course I could, you know. So anyway, I went there in 1984 November

and had an audience with the Pope. I was simply terrifying. But he said, he began by saying, do you still love your old friend? Sirius Lewis. I thought it was a very pastoral thing to say. You still love him. I said oh yes, so do father. Both friendship

and affection. He said, oh you knew I liked the four loves. I said almost everybody in the world does. So he talked about that but then he had read Christianity and many of the other works as well and then he wanted to know from me this is why I was thou. What was he like? Well, I did my best to say what he was like.

And at the end, I hope he would say something about Lewis. And I think he knew I was waiting for him to say something. So at the end, he said, C.S. Lewis knew what his apostolate was. I didn't know whether he'd finished. And then he said, and he did it. And I thought, that's the nicest thing ever said about Lewis. He knew what his apostol it was and he did it. Because you can know what your apostolid is and not do it.

But here's a man who did it. And he knew what he should do and he did it. And he's also effectively calling Lewis an apostle. Yeah, this. So what I'm going back to saying is that I realized from the degree on humanism that Catholics were now free to read Lewis, and they began when many of the Anglicans were becoming and many other denominations were caught up in liberalism.

There were some new readers of C.S. Lewis, and I was keen to catch those new readers, so I went to every conference that I was invited to to give talks on Lewis, you know, and when I went and joined Alice von Hildebrand in 1989 at Steubenbilt, I found that most of the Catholics were there because they wanted to hear me talk about the abolition of man. And when Cardinal Ratzinger came to Oxford, Cambridge in 1988,

I didn't see him at that time, but he gave his talk on the abolition man. Ratsinger. Because Ratsinger. Whatever happens to Ratsinger? Well, he became Pope Benedict the 16th. Oh, come on. But as before he became Pope, as you know, he said the biggest danger we now face is the dictatorship of relativism. And so that explains why he would have had so much.

much about Lewis's abolition of man. The abolition of man is absolutely prophetic. There's no question about it. Gosh, there's so much to talk about here. I think that, you know, when we say prophetic, people think we're talking about getting direct revelation. It needn't be direct revelation. It can be direct revelation.

But I would say that someone's understanding can be affected by revelation, and it's kind of transmuted into something like the abolition of man. But Lewis's ability to see these things, there's no way to describe it except prophetic, because he's saying things that are so deeply true. Anyone might have seen these things, but it doesn't seem that anyone else did,

and that's what makes a prophet a profit, not that they're saying something that doesn't exist. They're speaking it, and other people recognize it as true, but no one else is speaking it as true. For him to write the abolition of man so early, you said 42. Yes. It's an extraordinary thing. Well, I think you probably realize, you know, the first series of talks on Christianity,

are about natural law as well. Yeah. They are on the moral law, as he calls it. This is a special Oxford edition of the Eric Metaxus show. There is more of this conversation with Professor Walter Hooper coming up next. Welcome back to a special version of the Eric Mataxis show. It's a Socrates in the city event in Oxford, England. Right now, we're talking to Professor Walter Hooper about all things C.S. Lewis.

Let's rejoin the conversation. But you call it natural law. He wouldn't have called a natural law. No, he wouldn't because he didn't want it to be thought to be a Roman Catholic term. I mean, after all, he used different terms to make it fresher. Yeah. He never actually mentions the resurrection. the resurrection, but he talks about when Christ rose from the dead, you know? I mean, so he avoids

well-known words which, you know, sound like traditional Christianity. He tried to give it a fresh approach. You can't, it's still true, even if you use slightly different words for it. Well, it can be more true if you use slightly different words. Well, that's the thing. Basically, He was saying that. It's a famous quote. So if somebody Google's stained glass and Lewis and Narnia, they'll come up with it. But maybe trappings. But that he said that you cannot really see it if you've seen it so often.

You become inured to what you're looking at and you no longer see it. You take it for granted. And we have to recast it. And that's what he was doing in the Narnia books. When you recast it, suddenly people can see it. I've actually found that if I'm reading a verse of scrolls, scripture in a foreign language. And if I know what it says in that foreign language, it's refreshed. And I can actually hear it in a way that I can no longer hear it in English,

because the English has become stale. I've heard it so often. And there are terms like resurrection. I would say this is when vibrant green faith becomes dead religion. It becomes ossified, and you can have the trappings and the, but lack the power thereof. That to me is Lewis's principal strength is that he was able in so many different ways and so many different genres to refresh our understanding of immutable, eternal truths. That's a tremendous accomplishment. I cannot think of anyone in the 20th century who did it in anything that can compare with how he did it. Yes, it's one of his essays on the fairer tales say better what's to be said

and the quotation is in there we wanted to get past those Sunday school associations and the stained glass of association which sounds almost as though we were talking about a medical matter

some way to get past those watchful dragons that keep us from the tent to the truth. And getting past those watchful dragons is what he did so well. He was willing to talk about the Narnian stories with me.

He didn't really like talking about his own book. But we talked about I so told him the one to him that my favorite character was Paxford. I mean, the Pottle Glam and the Silver Chair. and he says, well, you know Pottle Glam pretty well. You met him a number of times.

He's Paxford the Gardner. I based it on here. Paxford was the most pessimistic man who ever lived. But he wanted the nicest. But Lewis gave me a very good example of his pessimism, his puddle glumishness. He said, when he and George, were going to Greece in

1960, Joy's cancer had returned. And they were going with their friends, Roger, and June Lanselin Green. But he said, here I, an old man, walking with a stick, Joy with cancer

return? What were we doing? Going to Greece of all places. Anyway, he said the loss straw seemed to have been arrived when Paxford came out to say goodbye to us. He was always listening to the wireless radio.

And he said, well, Mr. Jack, there was this airplane that's just gone down. Everybody killed and burnt beyond recognition. Did you hear that Mr. Jack, burnt beyond recognition? and on that note said Lewis we flew to Greece wow I think we all have a little we all have Paxfords and Puddlegums in our lives and I have to say I find it hard to like people like that

and puddle it's funny that you say Puddle glum is one of your favorite characters he's one of my least favorite precisely because that kind of thing drives me out of my mind but this brings me to something else, but puddle glum, the name puddlegum makes me, puts me in mind of it. Lewis's imaginative power is evidenced in part by his ability to create names and words. Puddle glum is genius. The term puddle glum.

Puddle glum, for those of you who remember, it's in the silver chair, that he only appears in silver chair. But he's described as a particular creature called a marsh wiggle. When you read that, a marsh wiggle is sort of brown, a little bit like a salamander or creature or something like that. But he invents a creature. To be able to plausibly invent a new creature is absolute staggering genius to do this effectively. because anybody can come up with some stupid creature that it isn't plausible, it's just a hot, but he creates a plausible creature that never existed, gives it this name of a marsh wiggle, which is just brilliant, and then names the marsh wiggle puddle glum. It's so appropriate. Lewis did that innumerable times in the Narnia Chronicles. He did it with, I think maybe my favorite is when he's talking. about, and I always get the mixed up, it's not in the silver chair, where he's talking about the land of bism and that, which one? Is that the silver chair? That's the silver chair. That is the silver chair. Yeah. The, the, he's talking about this world underneath this world. And this is, again, just outrageous power, imaginative power to create that world and to say that it's inhabited by these kinds of creatures. But he

gives them names that I find delightful and hilarious and apt. G-O-L-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-G-E-S-M-E. It's the land of B-I-S-M-B-I-S-M-M. And he over and over again does that kind of thing. And it's very hard to pull off, but he does it. And it shows me, it's part of how I see his greatness. Definitely. Well, not only wonderful names like that, but distinctions, you know, for children to read,

here's one of the most important distinctions, I think. I wonder how many adult books have anything as brilliant as this in it. In the voyage of the Dorn Tredder, they stop at this island where the people are invisible. and Lucy goes in and into the magician's house and she wants to read the spell that would make them visible and she does in the end. But she also is attracted to the magical book because one of the spells, if you say it,

will help you hear what your friends say about you. And she can't resist it and she says it. And so what she sees is like a train journey. These two friends of hers want her close friend and then somebody she doesn't know very well. And the close friend is intimidated by the bigger girl who said, are you still seeing that little Lucy Pevency? Well, I don't really like her very much.

I mean, she just throws herself at me. I'm just, you know, I'm friends because she wants to be friends with me. and poor Lucy breaks into tears and then Aslan appears and he said you know ease-dropping you know by reading these spells is same as eavesdropping in real life but will I ever forget it

no says Aslam that's the problem you won't forget it but he said there's a big distinction you should make here there's a big difference between what your friends say about you and what they think about you. And your friend thinks very well of you. She loves you very much, but she was afraid of that girl.

To make a distinction between what your friend's about you and what they think about you, what modern novel has anything as profound as that in it. This is a special Oxford edition of the Eric Metaxus show. There is more of this conversation with profound. Professor Walter Hooper coming up next. Welcome back to the Eric Mataxis show from Oxford, England, where I'm hosting several Socrates in the city events.

Right now, we're talking to Professor Walter Hooper about all things C.S. Lewis. Let's rejoin the conversation. Well, this is the thing. I mean, the reason that Lewis is so amazing, and I hope will last forever, is that I can hardly think of anyone who has such an array, of gifts. Tremendous wisdom, humor, and as I say over and over, tremendous creative power, imaginative power. I can hardly think of anyone who's his equal. There are passages at the end of Peralandra that are unlike anything I have ever read. He doesn't seem to get a tenth of the

credit that he should in the academy. Have you seen that? Have you seen that? effect, as you've put his work out there, that people in the academy, people who decide what ought to be part of the Western canon, have you seen them turn away from Lewis? Because it seems to me that if the world weren't crazy, some of his works would be taught, I mean, for example, Peralandra ought to be taught alongside Paradise Lost. In a survey course, for example, it rises to the level. It rises to the level. of genuinely great literature, much greater than many things that are now part of the canon. Well, I think part of the... You said someone told me yesterday that you were talking to somebody who said Lewis was not very popular here. When I first came to England and first got to know Professor Tolkien, he knew I was puzzled as to why say Mauden College, some of the dance had not liked Lewis

and he said, you see in Oxford you are only allowed forgiven for writing two different things you can write works on your field of study like history or art or theology or whatever it is and you can write detective stories because all dance at some point get the flu and they have to have something to read in bed. But you're not forgiven

is writing popular works outside your field, especially popular works which become internationally famous. But he said, Lewis knew that, but the reason he wrote them was because he was driven by his conscience.

He knew his apostolate. Yep, yes. and he knew it would cost him too yeah you know but his faith was strong enough that he didn't care he was doing what he felt God called him to do and made him to do but I still am amazed that some of his works I think most notably probably Paralandra are not part of the canon of Western literature in the 20th century

it seems to be something that it doesn't fit in with the narrative I mean the idea that Jack Kerouac's on the road or Alan Ginsberg's or any number of works that are infinitely inferior to Paralandra would be thought of as appropriate to be in the canon is as much less to do with literary quality than to do with the fact that they plug into the narrative somehow that, you know, even works by Fitzgerald or Hemingway, they're okay. They're not, there's nothing spectacular about them, even Fox. I hope I'm not stepping on your southern toes by saying it, but some of his stuff just seems pretentious. And yet the 20th century, that was the time to be pretentious. That was the time to try to do things that screamed,

look at me, I'm a modernist, or look at me, I'm a postmodernist. And if he didn't do that, you were likely to be ignored. I also know that has everything to do with Lewis's outspokenness about his Christian faith. Yes. But have you ever talked to anyone about that issue, that Lewis, that some of his works, which are so great, and the Narnia books are probably the ultimate example,

but they sort of disqualify themselves because they're thought of as kids' literature. But the idea that he's not accepted in that way. Well, I noticed that Lewis's newest books and those of Tolkien almost never reviewed in any of the papers, any of the journals, even though they will sell in the millions and the others won't. In 2000, I think it was, some of you may remember better than I do,

but there was one of the largest polls ever taken of books in this country, the largest poll amongst readers, not about critics. And anyway, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings was number one, and the line of the witch and the wardrobe was number 14. So they were very high on the list. And I was appalled to see that they were condemned. Every, all the newspapers condemned these critics condemn Lewis and Tolkien. Because they believed something else.

They didn't really like Christianity. but felt a strong desire to strike at it in this way in the poll. But as I'm reminded some of the Tolkien family, I said, don't worry about this. After all, it's the people, something like 400,000 people are the ones who said your father's work is the best that is. And Lewis's work, the best that is. so I wouldn't worry about that.

This is a special Oxford edition of the Eric Mataxis show. There is more of this conversation with Professor Walter Hooper coming up next. Enough we shall make on that beautiful show. This is the Eric Mataxis show. Today you're hearing a special Socrates in the city version of the show drawn from a number of events that I hosted in Oxford, England. Here's more of my conversation with Professor Walter Hooper. Part of what, I guess it was you discovered, was a manuscript of an unfinished novel called The Dark Tower, which led to some controversy.

But was that, where was that manuscript, by the way? This was one of those that was in the notebook books. It was a manuscript amongst the things that were being burnt when I took back to O'Keeble College. You dragged the dark tower down the hill in the suitcase. I did, yes. This is so amazing. Okay. So it wasn't just a few literary essays.

It was the dark tower. Okay. Well, the dark tower, for those who don't know what it is, is, as I said, an unfinished novel by Lewis. It is a little bit unlike anything else he ever did. When was it written, maybe 1939? I think probably about 1939. It was to be a sequel. to

out of the silent planet before he wrote Perilandra before he wrote Perilandra it sounds like the sequel

to Out of the Silent Planet which was published in 1938 Yeah And so this was written probably during

at the beginning of the war but before he began Perilandra it was partial that he had written

part of it but didn't know how to go on with it so he just put it aside and then started something else. And never came back to it.

He never came back to. It happened to Dr. Seuss. I just read today. But it's the kind of thing, of course. I'm a writer that you can do that. So he writes this, it's a fragment. I can remember maybe 80 pages or something like that. And I remember maybe it was in 98 or 2002,

to finally reading this and realizing that in some ways it's unlike Lewis, but in other ways it's clear that it is Lewis. The horror of it is, you get glimpses of it in the rest of the Space trilogy. I mean, these moments of real evil,

real menace. And he can create an otherworldly horror that is so creepy that, again, it shows you his imaginative power. But the dark tower I don't remember when was that

published finally 1970 77 okay some people who will remain nameless eventually accused you of having either written the dark tower or having written

parts of the dark tower and having then slipped it into the Lewis Oove just to get it out there. And when I read The Dark Tower, I didn't know you, and I didn't know too much about the controversy. I said, let me read this and let me see.

But I read it, and whatever that instinct is made me say, oh, this is definitely Lewis. This is, it's too good to be anyone else. Now, I don't know your writing abilities, but I thought there's something about it that it's those flashes of the Lewis genius. Definitely. And it is a very creepy story.

but what was that like to have people take your genuine love of Lewis and selfless service of Lewis and his work and accuse you of having tried to profit from it in that ugly way, not just financially, which they also accused you of, but which is ridiculous, but to try to be sort of a literary parasite. I mean, it reminds you, me of it, it would make a great novel, except it seems to me not just untrue, but, you know, scandalously untrue. But what was that like, if you can just tell us, to live through having to deal with this? It went on for 25 years, and there were three volumes involved by the same person. I was very sad at first, and the question was what to do. and my mother had said a number of things that they came to my mind at that time.

She said, if you can't say anything nice about somebody, then don't say anything at all. I'm sure your mothers have said the same thing. But that came into my mind. I think God wanted me to have something simple to rely on. If you can't say anything nice about people, don't say anything at all. so I never replied so the controversy so call was completely one-sided

because she said many many things I said nothing I still think probably I did the right thing but it was very very painful and I thought in the end the pity is that a person chooses to spend her

whole life, just heaping abuse on somebody else, when it would be better to do anything than that, you know. But I think, you know, the person who does that is going to make themselves more and more and more unhappy. It was very painful to live through. And when that person died well Michael Ward whom you know came the same tell me he said

I think you should know if you don't already the person who's been persecuting you for 25 years says die aren't you going to rejoice well I don't know what I would have done

except that that was not what I wanted to do So what helped me was to say a rosary for that person won seven days in a room by which time I felt, you know, I didn't want to rejoice, you know. But anyway, then it was right after that. I don't whether this person would have cared about this or not.

But you and I both know that there appeared one of Lewis's pupils Alistair Fowler who had written a piece in the Yale Review he didn't know about this controversy at all he didn't know anything about the

controversy he simply decided to write an essay in the Yale Review he was Lewis's pupil in 1952 yeah that's right okay and he said that you know besides talking about the thesis that he was writing Lewis was his supervisor

Lewis showed him the dark tower, and he said, I just don't know how to finish it. I don't know how to go on with it. This is a special Oxford edition of the Eric Mataxis show. There's more of this conversation with Professor Walter Hooper coming up next. This is the best of the Eric Mataxis show. Welcome back to the Eric Mataxis show from Oxford, England. Right now, we're talking to Professor Walter Hooper. about all things C.S. Lewis. Let's rejoin the conversation.

You can never refute these things 100%. There's always people who are sloppy and who will hear these things and so on and so forth. But yeah, for what it's worth, this has been put to rest more than once. I mean, it's, you know, it's very dead. But it's still interesting the idea that to be, to be so closely affiliated with someone's oove, it really strikes me as the idea for a spectacular novel. Sort of like the aspirin papers, I can't even remember the plot,

but the idea of this literary skull-duggery. Stephen King could do it. Yeah. Perhaps he could. But I don't read his trash. No, that's not true. He's a good writer, but I actually don't read King. But I just think it's such a great idea.

for a novel, especially since I know that it isn't actually true in this case, but I just love Lewis's just that fragment. Again, it's just such a treasure. There's so many treasures out there. We're probably out of time

for today. I think we have another moment or two. You told me earlier that you'd had a conversation with a Skylab astronaut. about the Dark Tower.

Can you tell that story? I will. One of the most unusual visitors that I've ever had was Joseph Kerwin. Joseph Kerwin. He's a medical doctor, but who's also an astronaut. And he said that he was educated in a Jesuit institution, and he was led,

while there, he read Lewis's science fiction. especially out of the silent planet and the others. And this led him to become an astronaut. Wow. He was the doctor in Skylab when he and other astronauts circled the earth for a whole... In the late 70s, yeah. Yes, for a month. He had become very fond of the dark tower,

and he spent his time. He had quite a lot of time in the... Skylab and he tried to complete the dark power. I haven't seen this completion of it, but he still, but he was, he visited me twice here and talked about writing. But the idea that he was influenced to become an astronaut, because there haven't been too many of those, by Lewis's science fiction trilogy. But he said that after they came down to Earth from Skylab, You don't mean that literally. I mean, when they got back,

when they, no, no, not. When they reentered the universe? When they re-enter the universe. Went from the kitchen end of the drawing room. But he said, he and the other astronauts agree that Lewis has a better, gives a better example of what the earth looks like from space in the other son of planet than they ever could having been born. That's just amazing.

What a joy to have this time with you, Walter Hooper. For now, we'll say goodbye. Maybe it would be appropriate to have a warm Socrates in the City. Oxford, thank you to Walter Hooper. Folks, you've been listening to a special Socrates in the City event from Oxford, England, and it's my privilege to share these events, these conversations, with you, my radio audience. I hope you've been enjoying them. We've got more coming up in the next hour.

This is a special English version of the Eric Metaxus show. Stay tuned.