Читать книгу The Neglected C. S. Lewis - Mark Neal - Страница 27

Lewis acknowledges that both Gnostic and materialist approaches to literature are destined to be faulty. The Gnostic (or hyper-spiritual) approach to literature seeks a meaning that is most likely a projection; the author paints a “Thus saith the Lord” across his or her opinions, making the projection equal to the word of God. Who could ever argue against someone who is convinced his ideas are equivalent to the word of God?

Also, Lewis believed, that “the typical modern critic is usually a half-hearted materialist.” The materialist “thinks that everything except the buzzing electrons is subjective fancy … because outside the poet’s head there is nothing but the interplay of blind forces. But he forgets that if materialism is true, there is nothing else inside the poet’s head either … there is no foothold left for the personal heresy.”⁶³ He adds, “You cannot have it both ways. If the universe is meaningless, then so are we; if we mean something, we do not mean alone. Embrace either alternative, and you are free of the personal heresy.”⁶⁴