Chapter 4 A Grief Observed

As I concluded the book I had no doubt in my mind that CS Lewis was one of my favorite authors, if not my favorite. He has so many aspects to his literature that make them classics. He may not be my favorite author, but in my opinion he is definitely the best author at imagery that I personally have read.

On the topics of images and imagery, Lewis covered both in chapter four. At one point he discussed the danger of images; even though they have importance I felt like he was saying that our images of reality cannot capture the absoluteness of everything, including the idea of God. I agree with the idea of God being unimaginable. I believe we can grasp some aspects of God but we as humans will never be able to see the full image of God in its entirety.

Just like in class when I believe it was Prof. Corrigan who discussed the idea of when God showed Moses his back because he would not be able to handle the greatness.

Back to the topic of Grief Observed, I was definitely intrigued by Lewis's description of grief being a long valley and hows it kept winding. I believe this is a very interesting image and the way he described it, it was fairly accurate.

I believe my favorite quote of this chapter would have to be, "Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process." I feel like he was saying that sorrow is just a phase not something one has to work through, but instead just wait it out. I somewhat agree, maybe we do not have to try to work through sorrow but instead... give in to sorrow and feel the grief. I'm not sure if that is what he is trying to get across, but that is how I took the idea of sorrow being a state. Though, the idea of sorrow being a process has a strong argument as well. I believe sorrow has to do with personal perspective.

A Grief observed, the first reading...

When I first picked up this book for the class, I had no idea what I was going to be reading about. I love reading C.S. Lewis, but oddly enough, I had never heard of this book. As I began to read the forward, I realized that A Grief Observed was going to be a very interesting read, and so far it has proven itself as a personal classic.

As I made it to the first chapter I understood that this was about C.S. Lewis's personal grieving over his wife. I understand the feeling of losing a loved one. I remember when my grandfather passed away it was very hard for me to understand why he was taken away from my life so quickly and I questioned God's motives somewhat like Lewis. I now realize that everything has a purpose in life but it does not make grieving over a love one any easier.

Chapter one really captivated my interest and I am excited to read the rest of this book throughout the course. My favorite quote of this first chapter was in the second paragraph, "There is a sort of invisible blanket between the world and me." I thought this was a great description of how separated he felt between himself and the world. As I continued to read the chapter I felt myself grieving with Lewis, it brings me back to emotions that I felt when I personally lost a love one. This book seems to be a direct link to the true Clive Staples Lewis and his raw emotions; I think I will learn a lot about his personal views on life from this book.

What We Talk about When We Talk about Love

I thought that What We Talk about When We Talk about Love, was a very interesting and well-written piece of literature. It contained intriguing dialogue which captured and painted a picture of several different things amongst the story. The dialogue of Mel strengthened the idea of his drunkenness, as he was noticeably getting off topic among other things portraying his drunkenness. Mel's dialogue also carried the entire story, everything revolved around his voice; I thought it quite interesting that he was the key speaker and since the narrator, Nick, narrated so very little.

Among the many things Mel played apart of in the literature was that he brought up and carried the main thought and point of the story; the point being that everyone has a different view and opinion on the idea of "love". There were many examples given that portrays this idea. The characters referenced past loves that loved "too much" and others that were "honeymoon" lovers, the list goes on. I think this idea of everyone having their own opinion or view on love is very interesting and very true. I really believe that every person in the world has a slightly different view on love than anybody else. Maybe it is because of cultural differences, age differences, or different lifestyles that everyone views love differently. One thing is true though, everyone has a want, a need for love. Some people try to find love through sex, some people try to find love through money and some people try to find it through friendships and others try many other options; the main idea though is to find love or attempt to fill the void that love leaves in one's life.

Love is an emotion that has control and a bind on people's lives like no other; it makes people feel on top of the world and then for some like the character of Ed it drives them crazy to the point of death. In the end, everyone has a long for love in their life and probably a different view of the idea of love than the person beside them.

Literary Profile

I have many memories that pertain to literature, they exist from early childhood to my present memory. Some of the earliest memories I have of literature are from when I would read Dr Seuss books as a child; my parents tell me that I enjoyed reading very much along with a love for the interesting pictures. I also remember reading my picture bible with my mom and dad almost every night before I went to bed. As it can be seen, I have always had a love for reading things that interested me whether it is from a Sports Illustrated magazine or a book on Pentecostal theology, I still enjoy reading. More currently I have been reading all sorts of genres of literature including books that help me grow as a believer in Christ, non-fiction stories. My favorite book belongs to the series of Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis, the The Last Battle. I believe literature is a very important role to our culture today and has served a very important role all through out history. Literature among many things helps capture ideas and paint pictures for readers to understand in their own way what an author was intending.