Lewis Writes a Grief Observed Lewis: A

Lewis writes a Grief Observed Lewis: A Grief Observed In C.S. Lewis' A Grief Observed, Lewis talks of the process of grief. Specifically, he discusses this process through a long and painful and journey which deals with the death of his wife. While he is not interested in going back he does talk about his love for his wife Joy and how this particular experience of grief meshes with ideas that he has expressed in some of the earlier things that he's written.

Even though he spends much time revisiting the memories of the past he says that he finds that he is terrified by the idea of going back and being happy begin in that same way (Lewis, 70). He goes through various stages of grief and his faith undergoes much analysis and reflection. Sometimes he remembers some of the things about Joy that affect him very strongly. He discusses the idea that neither men or women are completely masculine or feminine by themselves.

He believes that marriage is what corrects this and due to marriage the two people become fully human. He thinks about the masculine attributes that he sometimes viewed in his late wife Joy and talks about how understanding this actually deepened the marriage that they had and therefore the pain that came along with Joy's death. He also relates memories of the woman to memories of things that caused him joy when he was young.

There are times when he says that he mourns her the least but remembers her best (Lewis, 52). When he feels this way it is because he has gotten past the grief at least at that point so that he is able to properly remember the things that made her so special and important. It would appear that Lewis' life was divided into the before Joy and with Joy segments.

Once Joy left his life he needed to find a way to put the part of his life with her and the part of his life without her together again. He looked at the period of happiness that he had shared with her and had to rationalize the extreme happiness that he felt at that time with the short period of time that it lasted and wherever that all fits in the scheme of everything.

Once he was able to do this he could more realistically look at how it related to the Christian beliefs that he has. Even though one would think that Lewis' faith in God might be greatly shaken by the loss of his wife it appears that this is not the case. Lewis went through the grieving process in a way that many do not but all need to. He was willing to turn an angry face towards God at times.

He never forgot God or denounced him, but he did make it clear that he was angry at the fact that God had taken Joy away from him. Because he was able to do this he was able to work his way through his grief and come back to happiness of a sort, although the happiness that he felt after he grieved for Joy would never be the same type of happiness that he felt while she was still with him.

By the time the book ends one gets the sense that Lewis' faith in God is stronger than it was before Joy passed away. Once Lewis was able to come to terms with joy's passing he was able to understand not so much that God had taken Joy from him but that God had given him Joy for a brief period of time as a reminder of all that was.