SOURCE: "'One Mythology Among Many': The Spiritual Odyssey of C. S. Lewis," in Virginia Quarterly Review, Vol. 72, No. 4, Autumn, 1996, pp. 619-33.

In the following essay, Nelson provides an overview of Lewis's literary career and intellectual development.

The student's name was Ben. He was a first-year student in his first week of college, and as I ate my lunch in the refectory I could see that he was waiting for me to finish so that he could approach my table. "I hear that you are a Christian," he said when, my tray pushed aside, he at last came up. I nodded. "Well," he said, in a rush, "I'm a Christian, too, and last night I got into a long discussion in the dorm with some other students and they were saying things that I didn't know how to answer and I was wondering if you could help." Instantly the...