C. S. Lewis and the Craft of Communication. Steven Beebe

collaboration had concluded that the book was likely never started and certainly never completed. Although the publisher announced the Lewis-Tolkien book as forthcoming in 1949, Tolkien seems never to have started work on the project. According to a November 29, 1944, letter J. R. R. Tolkien wrote to his son Christopher, Tolkien and Lewis were “to begin to consider writing a book in collaboration on ‘Language’ (Nature, Origins, Functions).”¹⁵ Perhaps Tolkien would like to have written the book but simply was too busy or distracted working on The Lord of the Rings and a myriad of other projects. At any rate, Tolkien seemed to recognize that he had more ideas than time; after telling Christopher about the planned book about language with Lewis, he wrote, “Would [that] there were time for all these projects!”¹⁶ In conversations I have had with J. R. R. Tolkien’s daughter, Priscilla, she does not recall seeing her father work on the planned Lewis and Tolkien book.

In a 1950 letter to a friend, Lewis confided his own doubts that the book with Tolkien would ever be written. He added a few unflattering remarks about Tolkien’s procrastinating writing habits and then added in exasperation, “My book with Professor Tolkien—any book in collaboration with that great but dilatory and unmethodical man—is dated, I fear to appear on the Greek Kalends!”¹⁷ Walter Hooper, who expertly edited the Lewis letters for publication, provides a footnote to explain that “Augustus [and apparently Lewis] used ‘on the Greek Kalends’ for ‘Never.’ ”¹⁸

So why did this manuscript fragment survive, while drafts of other manuscripts, including manuscripts of The Chronicles of Narnia, did not? Lewis himself wondered, “Is there a discovered law by which important manuscripts survive and unimportant perish? Do you ever turn out an old drawer (say, at the breakup of your father’s house) without wondering at the survival of trivial documents and the disappearance of those which everyone would have thought worth preservation?”¹⁹ Hooper speculates, “This one survived because the notebook in which it was written contains notes on English literature that Lewis made a point of preserving.”²⁰

After experiencing my laundry eureka moment, and having other Lewis scholars confirm my conclusion, I sent a manuscript detailing my claim that this was the collaborative Lewis-Tolkien book to SEVEN, the premier journal of C. S. Lewis studies published by the Marion E. Wade Center. I received a polite response from the editor indicating that there was a publishing backlog; it could be up to nine months before I would hear back from them. So I waited. But not for ←xxi | xxii→long. I received an email the next week confirming that my find was important and informing me that my manuscript was accepted.²¹ I have had many publication acceptance letters, but this notice was the most thrilling of my career! Once I had strong corroboration that the manuscript fragment was indeed Language and Human Nature, my university disseminated a news release about the discovery, and newspapers and blogs around the world picked up the story. When I was in Oxford later in the summer, I was invited to participate in a couple of BBC radio interviews describing my discovery. The interview with BBC Ireland seemed especially apropos, given that Lewis was born in Belfast.

Although Lewis once described himself in a letter to his father as “a born rhetorician … I love to ‘ride like a cork on the ocean of eloquence,’ ”²² there is no evidence that he ever explicitly referred to his professional expertise as including “communication,” “speech,” or “rhetoric.” This book, however, suggests that C. S. Lewis should be considered for his knowledge, insight, and expertise as a communication scholar. His life’s work, what he wrote about, as well as his application of communication principles, provides evidence of his communication expertise.

      C. S. Lewis and the Craft of Communication is not only about C. S. Lewis and his communication principles and practices. It is also about you. My hope is that this book will facilitate your learning lessons from Lewis about how you can enhance your skill as a communicator. Chapter 9, “How to Communicate Like C. S. Lewis,” offers several specific applications about communication competencies inspired by what Lewis said about communication.

Lewis was a quintessential educator who would want his lessons about communication to endure. On describing the role of a good teacher, Lewis wrote, “The task of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles, but to irrigate deserts.”²³ This book is written to irrigate your understanding of communication. By better understanding Lewis’s principles of communication, each of us can learn strategies to enhance our own ability to write, speak, and relate to others so that we, too, can become master communicators.

      Steven Beebe

      San Marcos, Texas

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      Notes

       2. For example, see: Steven A. Beebe and Susan J. Beebe, Public Speaking: An Audience-Centered Approach 11th edition (Boston: Pearson, 2021); Steven A. Beebe, Susan J. Beebe and Diana K. Ivy, Communication: Principles for a Lifetime 7th edition (Boston: Pearson, 2019); Steven A. Beebe and John T. Masterson, Communicating in Small Groups: Principles and Practices 12th edition (Boston: Pearson, 2021); Steven A. Beebe, Susan J. Beebe and Mark V. Redmond, Interpersonal Communication: Relating to Others 9th edition (Boston: Pearson, 2020); Steven A. Beebe and Timothy P. Mottet, Business and Professional Communication: Principles and Skills for Leadership 3rd edition (Boston: Pearson, 2016); Steven A. Beebe, Timothy P. Mottet and K. David Roach, Training and Development: Communicating for Success 2nd edition (Boston: Pearson, 2014).

3. See: Kathryn Lindskoog, “A. N. Wilson Errata,” Into the Wardrobe: A C. S. Lewis Website. http://cslewis.drzeus.net/papers/wilson-errata/ Accessed April 21, 2017; Arend Smilde, “Sweetly Poisonous in a Welcome Way: Reflections on a Definitive Biography,” Lewisana.NIL http://lewisiana.nl/definitivebiography/ Accessed April 21, 2017; Bruce L. Edwards, “A Review of A. N. Wilson’s C. S. Lewis: A Biography,” http://personal.bgsu.edu/~edwards/Wilson.html Accessed April 21, 2017.

4. See: Abigail Santamaria, Joy: Poet, Seeker, and the Woman Who Captivated C. S. Lewis (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015).

5. “The Lefay Manuscript” fragment is published in: Walter Hooper, Past Watchful Dragons: A Guide to C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia (Glasgow: Collins, 1979).

6. See: Steven A. Beebe, “C. S. Lewis on Language and Meaning: Manuscript Fragment Identified,” VII: An Anglo-American Literary Review 27 (2010): 7–24.

7. Charlie W. Starr, “Villainous Handwriting”: A Chronological Study of C. S. Lewis’s Script, VII: Journal of the Marion E. Wade Center 33 (2016): 73–94.

8. For an excellent overview of Lewis’s handwriting and how it has evolved over the years and how the dates of a Lewis manuscript