Open the pages and suddenly, you find yourself in the midst of a world at once familiar and unfamiliar, a world torn between a group of scientific purists and religious idealists. Your friends are Mark and Jane, ordinary and unhappily married individuals, each trying to find place and purpose in the humdrum of daily life. However, you will soon discover that this world, like our own, is not controlled merely by human or natural forces. Rather, the supernatural world has immense interest and influence over human fate and the preservation of human dignity.
That Hideous Strength is the crowning jewel of C. S. Lewis’ brilliant trilogy [Out of the Silent Planet & Perelandra form the foundation.] Dubbed as a “modern fairy-tale for grown-ups†the book eludes any one literary category and yet masterfully interweaves elements of the utopia/dystopia, science fiction, fantasy, Christian allegory, and modern novel of consciousness genres. The metaphysics are not strictly Christian, but they do carry strong allegorical connections for the Christian reader.
After reading the full trilogy [wonderful, though the third book can stand alone] this summer, That Hideous Strength has become one of my favorite books—one I am sure to re-read time and again. It achieves a difficult balance. That Hideous Strength is fun enough for a lazy afternoon; yet, it delves deep enough to intrigue the mind and prompt the reader to reconsider the way he lives his life and participates in the various movements within in his own society. Happy reading!
5 responses so far ↓
1 Larry // Mar 1, 2007 at 3:35 pm
Kel’s 100% right - That Hiddeous Strength is a book that needs and deserves more attention. Absolutely anyone would enjoy it. It’d be a great for tree-huggers because it shows the supernatural nature that’s behind physical nature. I’d argue that the book could even appeal to people who have a pluralistic religious view. Lewis, once again showing us just how unbelievably talented he is, makes the book appealing to all sorts of people while at the same time giving the book an undeniable Christian slant.
2 Dave // Mar 1, 2007 at 5:42 pm
This has been on my ‘to-read’ list for far too long… I’ll have to move it up in the queue.
3 Adrienne // Mar 2, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Kelly, I recently read this book for my Inklings Class and it is quite an amazing and profound book! We were spending quite a lot of class time dissecting the book and still did not nearly get done analyzing it. Excellent posting!
4 Mike Hobart // Mar 25, 2007 at 8:57 am
I recently obtained a set of the four-part BBC radio serialisation of THAT HIDEOUS STRENGTH and have just listened to part 1. I haven’t read the original novel for years so some of the characters and incidents are lost in the mist of time and this was like hearing the story for the first time. It really works well on radio, at least in the opening episode, and I look forward to hearing the rest of the tale unfold.
5 Paul O'Brien // Apr 2, 2007 at 10:15 pm
The Space Trilogy was my first experience of Mr. Lewis when I was a wee 11 year old, slightly over half my life ago. I think it’s time to re-read!
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