NANCY ENRIGHT

e s . Lewis's Till We Have Facesand the Transformation of Love

PSYCHE TO ORUAL:

You are indeed teaching me about kinds of love I did not know. It is

like looking into a deep pit. I am not sure whether I like your kind of

love better than hatred. Oh, Orual—to take my love for you . . . and

then to make of it a tool, a weapon, a thing of policy and mastery, an

instrument of torture—/ begin to think I never knew you. Whatever

comes after, something that was between us dies here.

IN OXFORD ON THE PARKLIKE GROLINDS of Magdalen College,where C. S. Lewis was a tutor in English literature for many years,there is a tree-lined path called Addison's Walk, alongside a smallstream that runs eventually into the River Cherwell by Oxford'sbotanical gardens. This walkway is well known among those inter-ested in Lewis and the other Inklings—the group of Oxford-basedChristian writers who met regularly to discuss their works andread them aloud to each other—for Addison's Walk was the settingfor an important conversation Lewis had with J. R. R. Tolkien andHugo Dyson. At that time an agnostic, Lewis was deeply interestedin Tolkien's argument that, while Christianity's central story bears aresemblance to various myths of a dying and rising god, it is unique

L O G O S 1 4 : 4 F A L L 2 O I I

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE 93

in being "tbe true mytb," the one instance wbere tbe story for wbicbbumanity bas a deep longing to be true actually entered into histori-cal reality. It is natural,Tolkien argued, tbat otber mytbs reflect tbisstory, for tbey spring out of tbe innate buman longing for it. Aftertbis conversation, Lewis, always a lover of mytb, wrote to a friend:"I bave just passed on from believing in God to definitely believ-ing in Cbrist—in Cbristianity. My long nigbt talk with Dyson andTolkien had a good deal to do with it."^ As a Christian, Lewis vsTOteworks of theology, literary criticism, and fiction, the latter almostalways connected witb mytb in one form or anotber, wbetber writ-ten for cbildren, sucb as tbe Narnia series, or for adults, sucb as bisspace trilogy and Till We Have Faces. Tbis last work, written in themid-i95^os, has been acknowledged by Lewis as "bis best" (tbougbat otber times be said Perelandra, tbe second book of tbe space tril-ogy was bis best), and be dedicated it to his wife, Joy Davidman(Gresbam).^

In Till We Have Faces, more tban in any otber work of fiction,Lewis delved into tbe world of classical mytb, retelling tbe verywell-known story of Cupid and Psycbe. Revealing wbat be recog-nized as tbe story's intrinsic Cbristian message, Lewis tells tbe storyfrom tbe point of view of neitber of tbe two main cbaracters butfrom tbat of one of tbe original mytb's villains, Orual, tbe sisterof Psyche. This cbange allows Lewis to explore not only romanticlove (eros) existing between Psycbe and ber god-lover Cupid, butalso affection (storge) and friendship (philia). Lewis's telling of themytb botb celebrates and critiques all human loves, particularly thelove of Orual for Psyche (a love combining botb storge and philia),sbowing tbat any love, like all tbat is buman, must be redeemed andtransformed in order to be saved. In fact, Lewis's version of tbemyth of Cupid and Psycbe is an embodiment of tbe lessons con-veyed in bis famous tbeological work. The Four Loves* showing intbe love of tbe two sisters, even more so tban tbat between tbe twolovers, both the beauty and dangers of buman love and, despite tbedangers, the enormous power of God's love to transform it.

94 LOGOS

According to hoth Lewis and Tolkien, myth is a most appropri-ate vehicle for conveying such a message, for it reflects the humandesire for truth and for the divine. In his poem "Mythopoeia"Tolk-ien describes how myth is a vehicle for divine truth: "The heart ofman is not compound of lies, / but draws some wisdom from theonly Wise, / and still recalls him."' For Tolkien, and later for Lewis,myth was not a fiction hut a way for fallen humanity to convey someof the heauty and splendor lost with the Fall. Though we are nolonger untainted images of God, we retain many aspects reflectiveof his nature, one of which involves the ability to "sub-create," asTolkien calls it. Tolkien further explores this idea of subcreation inhis essay "On Fairy Stories" where he argues that fairy and folk tales,as well as myths (which he defines as generally a "higher" form ofstory), are all reflections of the human abihty to subcreate, a gift tous as a part of our inheritance of the divine image. As Tolkien, says,"Something really 'higher' is occasionally glimpsed in mythology:Divinity, the right to power (as distinct from its possession), the dueworship; in fact 'religion.'"^

In light of this understanding of myth making, no "pagan" mythneeds to be considered a rival to the truth about God, if only itcan be seen for what it really is—an imperfect reflection of whathas been perfectly revealed in the Gospel, which (in this context)can include all of revelation, going hack to the book of Genesis.Lewis speaks of the ability of classical mythology and other aspectsof various religions to convey Christian truth in his Mere Christianity,where he defines the term "Natural Law" as being the law of God in-nately grafted onto every human being and reflected in one way oranother in every culture and behef system.' Myth is, of course, onlyone of many expressions of the affinity between the human heartand the God from whom we are estranged. In a chapter titled "TheRival Conceptions of God," Lewis argues that a Christian, unlikean atheist, does "not have to believe that all the other religions aresimply wrong all through. . . . If you are a Christian, you are free tothink that all these religions, even the queerest ones, contain at least

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE

some hint of the truth."^ A similar view is expressed in the ground-breaking document from the Second Vatican Council, Nostra aetate,in which the council argued for a deep respect for all those aspectsof truth found in the varying religions of the world. The sense ofrespect advocated in this document extends not only outward toother religions in contemporary times, but also backward in timeto the ultimate religious sources from which many myths derive:"From ancient times down to the present, there is found amongvarious peoples a certain perception of that hidden power whichhovers over the course of things and over the events of human his-tory."' Any truth found in the myths making a part of nearly everyreligion would be, therefore, validated by this logic along the samelines that Lewis and Tolkien argue.

However, how do we get past the idea that Christianity is simplyone myth among many? This difficulty was the hurdle that Lewiscrossed, in part as a result of the conversation with Tolkien and Dy-son, in his conversion from atheism to Christianity. Sometime be-fore this talk, Lewis had read G. K. Chesterton's The Everlasting Manabout the life of Christ, '° and he found "the whole Christian outlineof history set out in a form that seemed to me to make sense," as herelates in his account of his conversion. Surprised by Joy.^' However,he was still unable to connect what seemed a viable historical re-cord with the beauties and profundity of myth that he so valued. Fi-nally, the two things came together for Lewis—the historical realityof the life of Jesus Christ and its identification as the one True Myth.Again in Surprised hyfoy, Lewis says, "If ever a myth had become fact,had been incarnated, it would be just like this."'^ As Ralph Wood ex-plains, "Lewis belongs, in fact, to the venerable Christian humanisttradition that can be traced back to Justin Martyr and the second-century Apologists. Their doctrine of the logos spermatikos—itself anotion borrowed from the Stoics—holds that God has planted theseed of his word in every time and place, culture and person."'^

This view of myth allows Lewis to uncover within the story ofCupid and Psyche a profound expression of the Gospel. At the end

96 LOGOS

of this novel, Lewis gives a summary of the myth as told by Apu-leius in his Metamorphoses (written in the second century) and alsoa brief listing of the changes he made to the basic storyline. In theclassic version of the myth, the youngest of a king's three daughters.Psyche, is so beautiful that she is worshipped as a goddess, incurringthe jealousy of the goddess Venus. Though her sisters marry royally.Psyche has no suitors, and her father is told by Apollo's oracle thatshe must be exposed on a mountain to be devoured by a dragon.Meanwhile, Venus pursues an alternative means to hurt her rival,sending her son, Cupid, to shoot an arrow into Psyche that willmake her fall in love with "the basest of men." However, seeing hergreat beauty, Cupid himself falls in love with her and rescues herfrom the mountain.

As Cupid's bride. Psyche lives in a beautiful palace where he vis-its her at night, but she is commanded by her lover not to look at hisface. When, at Psyche's request, her sisters visit the palace, they areconsumed with envy, though they express only delight. However,hearing that Psyche is not permitted to see her husband's face, theydisplay great concern over her welfare and convince Psyche that"her husband must really be a monstrous serpent," telling her totake a lamp and a knife into his bedroom and "see the horror that islying in your bed—and stab it to death."'* Psyche agrees, takes thelamp and knife, and looks on the face of her sleeping god-husband.Cupid awakens and vanishes, and Psyche is left to be abused by Ve-nus, who beats her and sets her a series of difficult and unpleas-ant tasks. Meanwhile, the two sisters are killed as a punishment fortheir malice. However, the story ends happily for Psyche, as Cupidfinally comes to her rescue and begs Jupiter to transform her intoa goddess. Even Venus is reconciled to her now divine daughter-in-law, and (though Lewis does not mention this in his summary)Psyche gives birth to a daughter, named Pleasure. The main changesLewis made to the story, as he lists them here, are making Psyche'spalace invisible and having as the protagonist not Psyche, but hersister, Orual, the narrator of the tale.

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE 97

These two changes are crucial in enabling Lewis to convey theGospel message through this story in a way that reflects the com-plexity of human love. First, as Lewis points out, the palace's invis-ihility renders the motivation of the sister (there is only one sistervisiting the mountain in his version) more mixed and much lessmalicious than that of the sisters in the original tale. Orual is liter-ally unable to see the beauties of the palace Psyche claims to beliving in, so it is difficult (though the story makes it clear it wouldnot have been impossible) for her to believe Psyche's account ofthings. It is certainly not simple envy that prompts Orual's actions,though jealousy is part of her character. Orual truly believes, orat least thinks she helieves, that her sister's husband is, in fact, ei-ther a monstrous "Shadow-Brute," divine hut hideous, or a hase andworthless human. She feels, at least on a conscious level, that hy try-ing to persuade Psyche to disobey her husband's command not tolook at his face and by her disobedience destroy her marriage, she isactually helping to liberate her sister from a horrible and degradingsituation. However, Orual's actual motives are not as pure as sheherself helieves, and it is largely through the redemption of Orualthat Lewis explores the depth and complexity of the three naturalhuman loves (storge, philia, and eros) and the salvation possible evenfor those who, like Orual, "know not what they do."

Storge (Affection)

In The Four Loves Lewis refers to storge, or affection, as "the hum-blest and most widely diffused of loves" and "the least discriminatingof loves."' Rooted in familial love and particularly connected withthe bond between parents and their children, especially mother andchild, storge is a love that embraces in a comfortable familiarity thosewith whom we are linked, whether these ties arise through family,work, neighhorhood, or something else. Animals, says Lewis, canenjoy storge with their offspring and even hetween breeds. He givesthe example of the pet cat and dog snuggling together (FL, ¡G). Lewis

98 LOGOS

makes a distinction between tbe two key parts oí storge: Gift-love andNeed-love. In relationsbips between a motber and cbild, the bestow-ers of Gift-love and Need-love are very clearly seen in tbe earlieststages of childbood, witb tbe motber giving birtb and tben care andmilk, and tbe cbild desperately needing all tbree to live. But, as Lew-is points out, tbe motber also needs to give birtb or suffer deatb justas sbe needs to nurse or suffer pain, and tbis paradox of Gift-love alsobeing a kind of Need-love adds complexity to storge, wbicb can—ontbe surface at least—seem very simple (FL, £4.). Lewis points out tbedanger of looking at storge tbrough the lenses of the greeting cardsand "saccharine poems" of popular culture (FL, 6 2). Though notbingcan be more natural tban storge, it can also be manipulated and falselydemanded in a selfisb and mean-spirited way.

One of tbe dangers of tbis kind of love if left unredeemed is tbatit can become voracious in its need to give. Lewis gives an exampleof a motber wbo creates all sorts of false "needs" for ber family tbatonly sbe can fill, only to assure berself tbat sbe "lives for ber family"(FL, 74—76). Anotber danger is an abuse of tbe familiarity allowedin a true relationship of storge in wbicb plain rudeness is excused intbe name of affection. Wbile storge lets us relax many of tbe formali-ties we use witb strangers, it never sbould allow for a lack of simplecourtesy and respect (FL, 66).

Perbaps tbe worst danger in unredeemed storge is jealousy. Tbisoccurs wben an object of storge breaks out of wbatever is "old andfamiliar" and takes on a new interest, wbetber literary, academic,religious, and so on. Lewis gives tbe example of a member of tbefamily or one of two siblings wbo takes on an interest tbat brings tbeindividual into a different set of values. Tbe reaction of tbe familymembers or sibling left bebind can be fierce. Says Lewis, "Affec-tion is tbe most instinctive, in tbat sense tbe most animal, of tbeloves; its jealousy is proportionately fierce" (FL, 71). Tbe jealousyis pointed against tbe new interest, wbatever it migbt be, but it canalso, paradoxically, extend to tbe cbild or sibling herself who hasmoved abead. Altbougb tbose left bebind often mock tbis interest

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE 99

as "silly nonsense," a part of them worries, "Supposing it can't he, it

mustn't be, but just supposing there were something in it?" (FL, ji).

This thought leads the jealous person to feel angry that the one he

knew so well has somehow found something important, meaning-

ful, and valuable, and he has not. What the "deserter" has found may

he heautiful, liberating, true, but the aggrieved does not understand

any of this and simply wants "their own" back among the clan the

way they once were. However, despite these pitfalls, affection is at

the heart of much that is comfortable and enjoyable in life. Storge

is the love with which we begin life, and it keeps us going through

many difficult and painful periods. It is only when storge becomes

"the absolute sovereign of a human life" that the potential fallen

nature of this love becomes apparent. As Lewis says, "Love, having

hecome a god, becomes a demon" (FL, 83). Even the humble storge

is subject to this possibility.

In Till We Have Faces, Orual and Psyche enjoy a relationship based

in storge, intensified by the great age difference between them. Oru-

al serves as a mother figure to the motherless Psyche, and she and

their Greek tutor, "the Fox," make a kind of odd family. Redi val, the

middle sister, is completely left out of this scenario. To Psyche, Orual

gives the loving and gentle care of a mother. She also offers her pro-

tection, unselfishly defending her when their father agrees to expose

Psyche on the mountain for "the Shadow-Brute" to wed or to de-

vour, the outcome at that point not clear to anyone. Orual is beaten

by her father for this defense of her sister, and Bardia, the soldier

whom Orual secretly loves (with eros), remarks on how brave she is

as she tries to defend Psyche from being taken. Psyche also enjoys

the comfort of this deep and motherly affection from her half-sister,

her "Maia,".as she calls her. Though much younger and thus not able

to give back equally to Orual, Psyche is devoted and loving in her

obedience while in their home. Together, both fill the void in each

other's life left by a dead mother (though they had different moth-

ers) and by an emotionally cold and sometimes cruel father. The

storge between Orual and Psyche is beautiful and fulfilling, though

LOGOS

imperfect—as shall be seen—and it is supplemented by the devel-opment of philia, friendship or sisterly love, in their relationship.

Philia (Friendship Love)

It might be argued that philia was the natural love that Lewis val-ued most, though he was an affectionate man (as he showed in hisrelationship with his brother and even with household workers, stu-dents, and other people in his Hfe) and though he enjoyed a deepexperience of ero5 late in Hfe in his marriage to Joy Davidman.

Describing his friendship with the other Inklings, Lewis said,"We meet on Friday evenings in my rooms; theoretically to talkabout literature, but in fact nearly always to talk about somethingbetter. What I owe to them all is incalculable. Dyson and Tolkienwere the immediate human causes of my conversion. Is any pleasureon earth as great as a circle of Christian friends by a good fire?"'* ForLewis, friendship involves the sharing of "some insight or interestor even taste which most others do not share and which, till thatmoment, each believed to be his own unique treasure (or burden)"(EL, 96).

Lewis describes philia as the natural love that is closest to that ofthe angels. Unlike storge or eros, which are visceral, physical, linkedwith common experiences shared by animals, philia is less "natural"(EL, 88—89). Lewis laments the lessening importance of philia inmodern culture. Classified by Aristotle as one of the virtues, andwritten about by Cicero in a book on amicitia, friendship love is lessvalued by modern people than family or erotic love (EL, 88). Lewisbelieved this loss to be a great one. Philia allows those who shareit a joy of companionship, coupled with what he calls "appreciativelove" that causes one to feel humbled to be among such a wonderfulgroup (EL, 104). Describing an ideal day among friends, he says:

Those are the golden sessions: when four or five of us after ahard day's walking have come to our inn; when our slippers

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE

are on, our feet spread out towards the blaze and our drinksat our elbows; when the whole world, and something beyondthe world, opens itself to our minds as we talk; and no onehas any claim on or any responsibility for another, but all arefreemen and equals as if we had first met an hour ago, whileat the same time an Affection mellowed by the years enfoldsus. Life natural life has no better gift to give. Who could havedeserved it? (f¿, ioj)

Key words in this passage include "freemen,""equals," no "claim . . .

or responsibility." Clearly part of the value oí philia for Lewis is the

openness, the lack of demand put upon friends. Very different from

its abuses, true friendship makes no manipulative demands. It is, at

its best, a free and beautiful meeting of souls.

However, like storge, philia also has its dangers, the greatest of

which might be its tendency toward exclusivity. By its very nature,

philia involves choosing one person over others because of a com-

mon bond, a shared vision. This quality of friendship can be very

painful to those excluded by it, though the pain caused is often com-

pletely unintentional. In The Four Loves, Lewis describes the process

in some detail: "We seek men after our own heart for their own

sake and are then alarmingly or delightfully surprised by the feel-

ing that we have become an aristocracy. Not that we'd call it that.

Every reader who has known Friendship will probably feel inclined

to deny with some heat that his own circle was ever guilty of such

an absurdity" {FL, 118).

Lewis's essay "The Inner Ring," which originated as the Memo-

rial Lecture at King's College, London, in 1944, argues much the

same point, also warning that the intoxicating nature of being on

the inside of "the Inner Ring" can lead many of us to wrongdoing

that we would not have considered on our own. ' ' St. Augustine's fa-

mous episode of steahng the pears with his friends would be a perti-

nent example.'^ Augustine also observes how the negative pressure

of friendship can lead to false claims as well as immoral actions:

IO2 LOGOS

"Afraid of being reviled I grew viler and when I had no indecentacts to admit that could put me on a level with these abandonedyouths, I pretended to obscenities I had not committed, lest I mightbe thought less courageous for being more innocent, and be ac-coimted cheaper for being more chaste."'' However, the best kindof friendship, redeemed and healthy, never exerts pressure of anykind from one friend to another. To do so would be to sin againstfriendship and, indirectly, against the God who brings friends to-gether. Lewis argues that what seems like chance meeting in thestart of a friendship, for a believer, is providential: "Christ, who saidto the disciples 'Ye have not chosen me, hut I have chosen you,' cantruly say to every group of Christian friends 'you have not chosenone another but I have chosen you for one another.' The friendshipis not a reward for our discrimination and good taste in finding oneanother out. It is the instrument by which God reveals to each thebeauties of all the others" (FL, 126). Lewis very likely had his fellowInklings in mind as he wrote those words.

o

In Till We Have Faces, Orual, Psyche, and the Fox, their tutor, en-joy philia, a friendship that develops out of their affection (storge),but goes beyond it through common interests. It is rooted in theintellectual sharing that the Fox instills in the two girls, both ofthem intelligent and interested in learning. The scenes where theFox instructs Orual and Psyche in the lessons he learned in hisGreek homeland are remembered by Orual as idyllic: "The years,doubtless, went round then as now, but in my memory it seemsto have been all springs and summers. I think the almonds and thecherries blossomed earlier in those years and the blossoms lastedlonger."^" Philia is a love of equals, and as Psyche grows up, she andher sister should be able to share a love that is increasingly sharedbetween peers, rather than of mother and child. However, Orual'svisit to the mountain tests the depth of the philia she has for hersister when she finds she is unable to accept Psyche's marriage forwhat she says it is, and, in seeking to destroy her sister's marriage,she destroys—at least for a time—the unredeemed philia that ex-

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE I03

ists between them.The three friends (Orual, Psyche, and the Fox)are also guilty of excluding Redi val, who felt particularly hurt byOrual's lessening interest in her when the Fox and later Psychecame along. '

Eros (Romantic Love)

Lewis differentiates between the romantic love, eros, and what hecalls venus, or sexuality. Lewis makes it clear that he does not thinkthat sex apart from eros is necessarily immoral. He notes that formuch of history, and even today for much of the world, most mar-riages were and are not based on romantic love, but arranged byfamilies and entered into by young couples with a sense of duty andperhaps only "animal desire" encouraging them to procreate (FL,I 32). While eros is beautiful and inspiring, it can also, if followedblindly, lead lovers to a sense that anything done in the name oflove is good—even adultery, deserting one's children, or betrayinga close friend (FL, 132—33). Unredeemed eros can be dangerous.

However, says Lewis, eros is miraculous in its ability to translate"what is par excellence a Need-pleasure into the most Appreciative ofall pleasures. It is the nature of a Need-pleasure to show us the ob-ject solely in relation to our need, even our momentary need. Butin Eros, a Need, at its most intense, sees the object most intenselyas a thing admirable in herself, important far beyond her relation tothe lover's need" (FL, 13^—36). Charles Williams wrote much aboutthis phenomenon in his two books on Dante, The Figure of Beatriceand Religion and Love in Dante,^^ advancing what he referred to asthe "Theology of Romantic Love ."According to Williams, the loversees in the beloved something utterly beautiful and meaningful, anexperience that can, if pursued rightly, also lead the lover to God,if the beloved is properly seen as a sign, not an end. Wrongly pur-sued, however, it can lead to the kind of love we see in Canto V ofDante's Inferno, where the lost lovers Paulo and Francesca forevershare a damned love, now become a torment." Lewis expresses a

IO4 LOGOS

view similar to Dante's when he explains the "god-like" quahty of

eros while also offering a warning:

We must not give unconditional obedience to the voice of

Eros when he speaks most like a god. Neither must we ignore

or attempt to deny the god-like quality. This love is really and

truly like Love Himself. In it there is real nearness to God

(by Resemblance); but not, therefore and necessarily, a near-

ness of Approach. Eros, honoured so far as love of God and

charity to our fellows will allow, may become for us a means

of Approach. . . . It is as if Christ said to us through Eros,

"Thus—just like this—with this prodigality—not counting

the cost—you are to love me and the least of my brethren."

(FL, IÍ3-Í4)

By learning the self-surrender, the reverence for "the Glory," as

Charles Williams calls it, revealed through eros and through the Be-

loved, we can learn, like Dante, the saving power of romantic love.

When Dante's beloved Beatrice leads him through much of Paradise

to an ultimate vision of God (to which St. Bernard actually brings

him), this experience perfectly exemplifies eros serving what Dante,

Williams, and Lewis would agree it was meant to do. All lovers

should comhine agape with eros in order for this love to be what it

is intended to he. The first encyclical of Benedict XVI, Deus cari-

tas est, explains the process: "Even if eros is at first mainly covetous

and ascending, a fascination for the great promise of happiness, in

drawing near to the other, it is less and less concerned with itself,

increasingly seeks the happiness of the other, is concerned more and

more with the beloved, bestows itself and wants to 'be there for' the

other. The element oí agape thus enters into this love, for otherwise

eros is impoverished and even loses its own nature ." ''

Though Eros is the Greek name for Cupid, Lewis focuses less

on eros in his version of the Cupid and Psyche myth than on the

other three loves, since it is Orual's storge and philia that have the

greatest need of redemption through agape. However, Psyche's ex-

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE

perience of romantic love is crucial to the climax of the story andis also shown to be in need of redemption. Because her marriageunites her with a god. Psyche experiences eros in a way that closelyresembles the soul's relationship with God. As we have seen, Lewisargues that all lovers in one sense experience love that is analogousto the soul's encounter with the Divine. It offers a likeness to God'slove that is "nearness of resemblance" but not necessarily "nearnessof approach," for the latter involves repentance, turning to God infaith, trusting in Christ as Lord and Savior, believing in His deathand resurrection on our behalf." Psyche's obedient love for andtrust in Cupid symbolize the kind of faith a believer must have forChrist.

Sally Bartlett argues that Psyche's marriage offers a view of therelations between the sexes that is, because of Psyche's submissive-ness, untenable for feminists. She argues that Lewis is offering thismarriage as a model of male-female relationships.^* Such a view,however, ignores the nature of Psyche's relationship with Cupid asrepresentative not of an ideal human marriage, but as a symbolicrepresentation of the soul's relationship with God, despite the ac-tual sexuality implied in it, a key component of the original myth.

Thomas Ramey Watson likens Psyche to the traditional depic-tion of the soul as the "Bride of Christ,"" thus rendering her sub-mission to her god-husband something beyond anything a humanwoman would or should offer to a mortal lover, but also render-ing it a potent symbol like the marriage depicted in the Song ofSolomon. However, Psyche's experience with her god-lover Cupidnot only offers a resemblance to our relationship with God but, forPsyche, is also an actual approach to God, since Cupid as the god oflove embodies both the Divine nature and, mythically rendered, theGod who is Love. Love in Dante's La Vita Nuova plays a similar role,recalling the classical figure of Eros and treating him as embodyingthe source of all love, the Christian God, who is revealed by theend of The Divine Comedy.^^ Psyche's faith in her lover, her surrenderto him, and her trust in his apparently unreasonable command not

io6 LOGOS

to look at his face represent the human beloved's ideal response toDivine Love and are for Psyche spiritual acts of faith in the DivineNature, still only tentatively defined, but present in the god or godswho function in the city of Glome and on the mountain.

Orual does not understand her sister's experience of eros, andthis conflict is at the heart and climax of the novel. Since Psyche'smarriage is rooted in her spiritual life, Orual's rejection of it andher unwillingness even to consider Psyche's perspective on her ownrelationship with her husband reveal the weakness of all three loves

_ {storge, philia, and eros) when unredeemed. Psyche's unusual mar-riage is the test case, the crucible that shows the storge and philiaexisting between the two sisters, particularly those of Orual forPsyche, to be found wanting and in need of redemption.

However, even Psyche, with her noble and self-sacrificing na-ture, is shown deficient in eros, the love with which she is mostconnected in the story. Watson says, "Though Psyche, hke the soul,exhibits Gift-love (or agape), becoming the bride of Eros, echoingthe Bride of Christ in Christian tradition, she too must experiencethe enlargements of love—even if not through her own design. Thatis the mortal condition—for as the spirit of the Fox tells Orual atthe end of the novel, 'All, even Psyche, are born into the house ofUngit [a primitive form of the goddess Venus]. And all must get freefrom her'" {FL, 301).^' Such love cannot—at least on postlapsarianearth—exist only in the soul."'" Had her love for her husband beenperfect, she would not have let her sister persuade her to disobeyhis injunction. Her imperfect eros, like the much more imperfectstorge and philia exhibited by her sister, illustrates how agape is need-ed to transform all human love into something more deeply andcompletely expressive of the Love of God, a transformation leadingto the fullness of salvation.

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE I07

Agape (Charity) and the Redemption of the Three Loves

Agape, according to Lewis's The Four Loves, is the love that God hasfor each of us and the love that we can, if we are open to God'slove, share with others. It is Gift-Love, which seeks the good of thebeloved and helps the other kinds of love avoid the pitfalls that canturn any of them into a kind of hatred. Since Orual is the main char-acter in this novel, her loves are the ones most carefully analyzedthrough her own self-reflective and (at least in intention) honestbook. Though her hook is in the end revealed to be self-deceptive,Orual's writing of it is a vehicle for her to imderstand the fallennature of her love for her sister.

As described earlier, Orual's storge and philia for Psyche exhibitseveral of the weaknesses Lewis outlines regarding these loves intheir unredeemed state in The Four Loves. Her affection for Psyche,while self-sacrificing and tender, betrays a degree of possessiveness.Her love for her sister is passionate: "I wanted to be a wife so thatI could have been her real mother. I wanted to be a hoy so that shecould be in love with me. I wanted her to be my full sister insteadof my half sister. I wanted her to be a slave so that I could set herfree and make her rich" (FL ,23). The key words here are "I wanted,"with no focus on what the beloved Psyche wants. Orual's Gift-loveis so deeply entrenched in her Need-love, impelling her to be thegiver to Psyche, that it is corrupted by the intensity of her desire.When Psyche is demanded by the Priest and townspeople as a sac-rifice to Ungit, her resignation angers Orual, who feels betrayedby her sister's willingness to leave her. She says, "I would have diedfor her (this, at least, I know is true) and yet the night before herdeath, I could feel anger. She spoke so steadily and thoughtfully, asif we had been disputing with the Fox, up hehind the pear trees,with hours and days still before us. The parting between her and meseemed to cost her so little" (FL, 71). In reality. Psyche also feelssome pain, but her spiritual life is strong enough to enable her tobear her sacrifice calmly.

IO8 LOGOS

At the end of the novel, when Orual stands before the godswith her accusations against them written in her book, the realityof her words reveal the jealousy within her love for Psyche: "Youknow well that I never really began to hate you until Psyche begantalking of her palace and her lover and her husband. . . . Those welove best—whoever's most worth loving—those are the very onesyou'll pick out. . . .We'd rather they were ours and dead than yoursand made immortal" (FL, 290—91). Unlike the simple jealousy ofthe two sisters in the original myth, Orual's jealousy is far morecomplex; she wishes to be the one to reveal the truth to her sis-ter, having a kind of ownership over her, as she admits in her finalwords from the book she wrote: "We want to be our own. I wasmy own and Psyche was mine and no one else had any right toher"(fL, 291—92). However, she prefers most of all for the truth tobe sorhething with which she is at home and comfortable, nothingnew, divine, or strange.

Distorted storge also causes excessive pride in Orual about hersister's lineage and beauty. When she believes the Fox, who assumesthat Psyche is the mistress of a man in the mountains, a vagabond,and perhaps a criminal, Orual rages at the idea: "Curse him, cursehim! Psyche to carry a beggar's brat? We'11 have him impaled if everwe catch him. He shall die for days. Oh, I could tear his body withmy bare teeth" (FL, 146).The Fox, always the voice of reason in thisnovel, replies, "You darken our counsels and your own soul—withthese passions." Orual's pride in her sister is one of ownership, notappreciation, a deeply important difference. This sense of owner-ship shows itself most in Orual's encounters with Psyche on themountain when she tries to assert her former authority over hernow grown-up sister by commanding her to leave her husband.Psyche gently but firmly affirms her new duties: "I am a wife now"(FL, 12^). In The Four Loves, Lewis warns against the kind of storgethat seeks to keep the role of giver by infantilizing the recipient ofthe love: the mother who never wants her child to grow up, the pro-fessor who cannot bear to have his pupils become his equals; such

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE I09

love can he deadly to hoth the giver and recipient of it (FL, 73—78).But there is more to Orual's perversion oí storge than that. Again, asLewis descrihes in The Four Loves, religion is often resented by theparent or sibling left behind by a loved one's interest in it. It is whenPsyche expresses faith in the divine aspects of her marriage thatOrual becomes most furious, cringing at the mere thought of it.She describes her reaction to Psyche's telling of her invisible palacein words suggesting confusion about her own feelings: "For somestrange reason, fury—my father's own fury—fell upon me whenshe said that. I found myself screaming . . . 'There's no such thing.You're pretending. You're trying to make yourself believe it.' But Iwas lying. How did I know whether she really saw invisible thingsor spoke in madness? Either way, something hateful and strange hadbegun" (FL, 118). Orual speaks to Psyche as if she is sure that whather sister believes is madness, that she is in a degraded and base re-lationship with a common man of the mountains, hut Orual's heartis torn with misgivings: "For the world had broken in pieces andPsyche and I were not in the same piece" (FL, 120).

As she is leaving the mountain, Orual gets a glimpse of the su-pernatural palace, a chance given by the gods (God) to return, inrepentance, to her sister. Orual neither affirms nor denies the vi-sion, hut simply returns to the soldier Bardia, who accompanied herto the mountain, and tells him nothing of the vision. When Bardiaconfirms Orual's tentative helief that her sister's lover is most likelya divine monster, "the Shadow-Brute," she is no less horrified by thisnotion than the former one that the lover is a common man, perhapsa criminal.

However, once she returns, the Fox (from whom Orual alsokeeps the vague hut important vision) argues again for the naturalinterpretation of Psyche's situation, mocking any suggestion of thedivine nature of the marriage. He encourages Orual to find a way topersuade her sister to leave her husband, so she can get "care," an an-cient version of psychological help. As she makes plans with the Fox,her passion rises to such a degree that she tells him she will kill her

no LOGOS

sister rather than leave her in this degrading marriage.The Fox, as al-ways speaking with reason's accuracy, again rebukes her: "Daughter,daughter. You are transported beyond all reason and nature. Do youknow what it is? There's one part love in your heart, and five partsanger, and seven parts pride" (EL, 148).

Once Orual decides that it really does not matter who is right—Bardia or the Fox—because either interpretation involves her sisterin a marriage to someone, something horrible and terrifying, shegoes back to the motuitain to persuade Psyche a second time. Thissecond encounter deepens the void between the two sisters and ex-hibits the reality of Orual's deficiency in love, this time her philia,for her sister.

On her second visit, Orual tries to convince Psyche that her hus-band is "either a monster—a shadow and monster in one, maybe,a ghostly, undead thing—or a salt villain whose lips, even on yourfeet or the hem of your robe, would be a stain to our blood" (EL,160). Twisting the truth, she tells Psyche that Bardia and the Fox"agree" that her husband is "either Shadow-brute or felon," leavingout the important difference in their interpretation and saying thatall of Glome "would say the same" (EL, 161). Psyche calmly replies,"But what is all this to me? How should they know? I am his wife.I know" (EL, 161). The argument that ensues is bitter, ending withOrual's threat of suicide, to which she adds power by thrusting hersword through her own arm (EL, 164).

This act of psychological manipulation goes against the deep-est nature of philia, which, as we have seen in The Eour Loves, is afree meeting of souls. Orual does not respect Psyche's freedom andseeks to force her to do her will, using her sister's love for her as theweapon (as Psyche herself points out). And it works. Psyche agreesto look upon her husband's face, acknowledging "I know what I do. Iknow that I am betraying the best of lovers and that perhaps, beforesunrise, all my happiness may be destroyed forever. This is the priceyou have put upon your life. Well, I must pay it" (EL, 166).

If Orual had entertained any doubt that her use of the threat of

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE 11 1

suicide was morally acceptable as a means of persuading her sister,the Fox clarifies this for her in the negative when she returns. Shenever tells him of the suicide threat and self-inflicted sword thrust,but the Fox knows she is keeping a secret from him. In words thatmust be painful for Orual to hear, the Fox assures her that he willnot try to force her to tell him what occurred: "Friends must befree. My tormenting you to find it would build a worse barrier be-tween us than your hiding it. Some day ^—but you must obey thegod within you, not the god within me" {FL, 180). It is exactly thisfreedom to obey "the god within," in other words, her sister's ownleading from God, that Orual has denied Psyche by her threat ofsuicide. Philia has been unmade between them. As Psyche says onthe mountain, "You grow more and more a stranger to me at eachword. And I had loved you so. . . . And now—but I can't have yourblood on my threshold. You chose your threat well" {FL, 166). Theresult is Psyche's exile from her lover and Orual's facing years ofagony of remembrance.

Just as Orual will eventually come to repentance and forgivenessof her sins, both against her sister and against the gods. Psyche mustalso undergo a transformation. Even as a young girl, she already waswell along the road to redemption, a truly "self-sacrificing Christ-like"person, as George Sayer calls her." Watson considers Psyche tobe "like the suffering servant in Isaiah ^3, recognized by Christiansas prophetic of Christ—[she] must take the illnesses of the peopleupon herself, suffering for their transgressions that they might behealed, a suffering carried out not only in healing the people of theirplague, but also in bealing her sister—and all dichotomies who pat-tern themselves after her—of their unbelief."' Of all the charactersin Lewis's fiction, only Asian the Lion in the Narnia series is moreclearly rendered as an image of Christ. Psyche is even tied to a tree,as Jesus was hanged on one, willingly offering herself in redemp-tion for her people {TWHF, 107, 109). However, unlike Asian, sheis not perfect, nor is she the dominant image of Christ in the novel.Her god-husband Cupid takes that role. Psyche shows a deficiency

112 LOGOS

of love, of both eros and agape, in allowing her sister to convince herto disobey her husband's command not to look at his face. True, inLewis's version of the myth, she is far less blameworthy than she isin the original, where her sisters actually convince her to doubt herdivine lover and willingly disobey him. Lewis's Psyche has no suchdoubts, although she is manipulated by her sister's threat of suicide,tinable to bear the thought of heing responsible for Orual's death.

Psyche hopes that Cupid will understand her actions: "He willknow how I was tortured into my disobedience. He will forgiveme," and while he eventually does forgive her, she first undergoes aperiod of exile and trial (TWHF, i66). Most of these trials involveperforming tasks devised hy the malicious Venus, mother of Cu-pid, but Lewis depicts these tasks as heing ameliorated by the helpPsyche receives, a type of grace. As St. Paul says, we must "workout our salvation with fear and trembhng," but—at the same time,"knowing that it is God who is at work in you both to will and towork for his good pleasure."'^ Psyche works, but grace makes "theyoke . . . easy," as Jesus says of service to himself. "" Orual, who hasheen told by the god that she also "shall be Psyche," must perform ina vision the same tasks, hut they are harder for her. The implicationis that Psyche understands how to submit herself to grace but Orualhas yet to learn this.

However, what Psyche must learn is how to move beyond themanipulative power of her sister. Though giving in to Orual's de-mands in order to keep her from committing suicide may haveseemed a noble thing to do, Lewis suggests in one of Orual's finalvisions that Psyche must learn to keep her eyes focused on what shemust do and not be distracted or dissuaded from it even though pityor misguided human love urges her to turn aside. As in the originalmyth. Psyche has a final task of going to the world of the dead andbringing back to Venus "the heauty of Persephone, the Queen of thedead." She is told that on her way she would be asked for help bymany people who "seemed to deserve her pity, hut she must refuse

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE II3

them air (TWHF, 3 12).This odd but divine command makes moresense in Lewis's version of the myth in that his Psyche actually hasalready committed a sin of disobedience out of pity and fear for hersister.

In a vision, Orual sees Psyche traveling through the world of thedead and tempted by many voices calling for her help, along v\riththe Fox telling her that her beliefs are "all lies of priests and poets,"and finally Orual herself, though at first she does not recognize whothe woman is, begging Psyche to return. As the woman reachesout to Psyche, Orual sees her left arm dripping with blood, and astab of self-recognition must surely shake her, as she hears her ownvoice calling out to her sister (TWHF, 302—04). But this time, unlikethe encounter on the mountain. Psyche is not persuaded, but withgreat pain and strong will ignores the pleas of her sister and obtainsthe box filled with the beauty of Persephone. Like Peter, asked byJesus to affirm his love three times, even as he had denied Jesusthree times,^^ Psyche must reenact the incident in which she failedin love (i.e., by giving in to her sister's pleas and thus disobeyingher god-husband). She returns triumphant, bearing the cask. Hersuccess leads not only to her own fullness of redemption, but alsoto Orual's, who is brought through these visions to a place of fullrepentance. Seeing the real Psyche, now like a goddess and no lon-ger a mere vision, Orual bows before her, confessing, "Never againwill I call you mine; but all there is of me shall be yours. Alas, youknow now what it's worth. I never wished you well, never had oneselfless thought of you. I was a craver" (TWHF, 30^).

The redemption of Orual is complete when Psyche gives her thecasket filled with beauty. She says to her sister, "Did I not tell you,Maia . . . that a day was coming when you and I would meet in myhouse and no cloud between us?" (TWHF, 306). Orual sees herselfand her sister reflected in the water, both now beautiful, both trans-formed, the god's voice confirming the transformation, "You alsoare Psyche" (TWHF, 308). All Orual's fears of the gods, her doubts

114 LOGOS

about herself and ahout her sister's encounter with the god of themountain, are resolved. She says to him: "I know now. Lord, whyyou utter no answer. You are yourself the answer" (TWHF, 308).Agape has swallowed up storge, philia, and eros, transforming all intoa love beyond human understanding or capacity.

In The Four Loves, Lewis describes the fullness of salvation suchas that experienced by Orual and Psyche: "When we see the faceof God we shall know that we have always known it. He has beena party to, has made, sustained and moved moment hy momentwithin, all our earthly experiences of innocent love. All that wastrue love in them was, even on earth, far more His than ours, andours only hecause His" (FL, 190—91). Though Psyche says to Orualon the mountain in their terrible struggle over her marriage to Cu-pid that "something between us dies here," in the Gospel, reflectedin the myth as Lewis recounts it, death is only the pathway to resur-rection.

Notes

1. C. S. Lewis, TiW We Hare faces (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1988), 16^.

2. Humphrey Carpenter, The Inklings: C. S. Lewis,J. R. R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, and their

Friends (Boston: Houghton MifFlin, 1979) 4 i .

3. George Sayer,yaci.C. S. Lewis and His Times (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1988),

236.

4. C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves (NewYork: Harcourt, Brace, and Co., 1960).

¡. J. R. R.Tolkien, "Mythopoeia,"in 7ree aniJica/^(London: HarperCollins, 2001), 83.

6. J. R. R.Tolkien, "On Fairy Stories," TheToIkien Reader (London: Unwin, 197^), 83.

7. C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (NewYork: MacMillan, 1977), i 1—2 i.

8. Ibid., 43.

9. Paul VI, Nostra aetate, i .

10. G. K. C h e s t e r t o n , The Everlasting Man (San Francisco: Ignatius Press , | I 9 2 Î J 1993) .

1 1 . C. S. Lewis, Surprised by ]oy:The Shape of My Early Life (New York and London: Har-

court, Brace, Jovanovich, 19ÍJ:), 223.

12. Ibid., 136.

13. Ralph Wood, "The Baptized Imagination: C.S. Lewis's Fictional Apologetics," Chris-

tian Century I, no. 2¡: 8 i 2.

14. L e w i s , Till We Have Faces, 3 1 2 .

THE TRANSFORMATION OF LOVE

¡¡. Lewis, The Four Loves, Î3—Î4. All subsequent references to The Four Loves will be

cited parenthetically in the text as FL.

16. C. S. Lewis, Letter to Dom Bede Griffiths, OSB, Dec. 21, 1941, The Letters of C. S.

Lewis, edited with a memoir by W H. Lewis (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1966),

197.

17. C. S. Lewis, "The Inner Ring," in TheWeight of Glory and Other Addresses (San Fran-

cisco: Harper, 1976; rev. 1980), 141—^7.

18. Augustine of Hippo, The Confessions, trans. Maria Boulding, OSB (Villanova, PA:

Augustinian Heritage Institute, 1997), Bk. II, ch. 4, sec. 9, 30.

19. Ibid.,Bk. Il,ch. 7, 29.

20. L e w i s , Till We Have Faces, 2 2 .

2 1 . Ib id . , 2¡¡.

2 2. Charles Wilhams, The Figure of Beatrice: A Study in Dante (New\ork: Octagon Books,

1980); Charles Williams, Religion and Love in Dante (Westminster: Dacre, 1941).

23. Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, Inferno, trans. Allen Mandelbaum (New York:

Bantam, 1982), CantoV, lines 79—142, 4^—47.

24. Benedict XVI, Deuscar/tfls est, 3.

2^. Lewis, Till We Have Faces, i¡—i-j.

26. Sally Bartlett, "Humanistic Psychology in C. S. Lewis's Till We Have Faces: a Feminist

Critique," Studies in the Literary Imagination 22, no. 2: 199.

27. Thomas Ramey Watson, "Enlarging Augustinian Systems: C. S. Lewis'The Great

Divorce andTill We Have Faces." Renascence 46, no. 3: 175 .

28. Dante Aligheri, La Vita Nuova, trans. Barbara Reynolds (Baltimore, MA: Penguin

Books, 1971).

29. Lewis, Till We Have Faces, 301. All subsequent parenthetical citations in the text refer

to Till We Have Faces as TWHF

3 o. Watson, "Enlarging," i 2.

3 1. Sayer,Jack, 234.

32. Watson, "Enlarging," 14.

33. Philippians 2: 12—13. ^^^ American Standard Bible (Lockman Foundation).

34. Matthew i i: 30.

3Í. John 2 1: i j - 1 7 .

Copyright of Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought & Culture is the property of Logos: A Journal of Catholic

Thought & Culture and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without

the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for

individual use.