The Tears That Raised C.S. Lewis’ “Atlantis”
How C.S. Lewis’ Fiction Gave Perspective on His Tragic Loss
Who we are is shaped by our experiences, both good and bad. God has promised to work all things together for the good of those who love Him, but most of us probably still have a desire for a do-over, a chance to change something in the past.
For C.S. Lewis, his fiction allowed him to “right a wrong,” but also served as a reminder of God’s goodness even through those hard moments.
The Sinking of Idyllic Atlantis
The first few years of Lewis’ life fit into an ideal childhood. He had loving and educated parents, an older brother who enjoyed spending time with him, and other people in his life who regularly encouraged him. And beyond all that, he had books and time to spare.
In Surprised by Joy, he wrote:
I am the product of long corridors, empty sunlit rooms, upstair indoor silences, attics explored in solitude, distant noises of gurgling cisterns and pipes, and the noise of the wind under the tiles. Also, of endless books.
In this happy childhood, his mother, Flora Hamilton Lewis, was the calm, upbeat force in their family. His father, Albert, ran more hot and cold, but still loved his sons.
Flora was also a brilliant, groundbreaking woman, likely part of the first group of women to graduate from the Royal University of Ireland in Belfast (now Queen’s University in Belfast). She excelled, earning honors in both logic and mathematics.
Later, she became a published author and taught at the Ladies University School in Wellington Park. Also a skilled musician, she gave violin examinations and public recitals.
Before marriage, Flora established herself as a Renaissance woman. Marriage didn’t change who she was; it merely redirected her energies. She married Albert in 1894,1 and had Warren in 1895 and Clive Staples in 1898.
While the boys had both a nursemaid and a governess, Flora supervised their education, teaching them French and Latin. She organized trips to the sea and taught them how to play chess. But the idyllic Lewis family life came to an end in 1908, when C.S. was nine.
In Surprised by Joy, he wrote:
There came a night when I was ill and crying both with headache and toothache and distressed because my mother did not come to me. That was because she was ill too; and what was odd was that there were several doctors in her room, and voices and comings and goings all over the house and doors shutting and opening. It seemed to last for hours. And then my father, in tears, came into my room and began to try to convey to my terrified mind things it had never conceived before. It was in fact cancer and followed the usual course; an operation (they operated in the patient’s house in those days), an apparent convalescence, a return of the disease, increasing pain, and death.
Flora died on August 23, 1908, when she was just 47. Lewis saw this as the seismic event in his life.
With my mother’s death, all settled happiness, all that was tranquil and reliable, disappeared from my life. There was to be much fun, many pleasures, many stabs of Joy, but no more of the old security. It was sea and islands now; the great continent had sunk like Atlantis.
The Hopeful Raising of Atlantis
As Lewis was writing the Narnia series, he was also writing Surprised by Joy, reliving his mother’s death and the aftermath.
After completing The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, he tried to write the creation of Narnia with Digory, but couldn’t make it work. He kept trying and putting it aside to finish the other books that came much easier. Finally, after finishing The Last Battle, he returned to Digory and his sick mother in The Magician’s Nephew.
In the prequel, Digory overhears adults talking about the grim fate of his mother. “Nothing in this world will do much.” You can imagine Lewis heard similar conversations as a child. But in the reconstruction of his story with Digory, other worlds exists and there could be hope there.
Later in the book, Digory finds himself in what amounts to “the land of youth” and holding fruit that likely would bring life to his mother. But he is faced with “the most terrible choice.” He had been sent to retrieve the fruit by Aslan.
Digory overcomes the temptation and fulfills his promise to Aslan, but even still, he’s not sure he made the right choice. What reassures him is remembering the tears of Aslan.
When he first asked about healing his mother, Digory looked at Aslan’s face and saw “such big, bright tears compared with Digory’s own that for a moment he felt as though the Lion must really be sorrier about his Mother than he was himself.”
After Digory brought the fruit, Aslan told him to plant it as protection for Narnia. Just when he gave up all hope for his mother, the Lion tells Digory to go pluck an apple from the protection tree. “What I give you now will bring joy. It will not, in your world, give endless life, but it will heal,” Aslan says.
In Alan Jacob’s The Narnian, he writes:
The choice that Digory faces is, fundamentally, between magic and faith. Magic is power; magic compels. … [Instead] Digory trusts Aslan—has faith in him—not because he can really understand what Aslan is telling him, but because of those tears.
Lewis gives Digory what God did not give Lewis in his childhood, but what carries Lewis forward is the same trust of Digory. Lewis could write Digory’s hopeful ending because Lewis held that same hope. His mother would be healed, and he would see her again. He just had to wait longer than Digory.
Because Christ is raised from the dead, Lewis trusted that Atlantis, his mother, would rise as well. What gave him that hope? The tears of a God who is Himself acquainted with suffering and makes all things right.
Sources:
Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life — C.S. Lewis
“The Sinking of Atlantis: Flora Lewis” — Crystal Hurd
“Florence Augusta Hamilton: Mother and Mathematician” — Robyn Atcheson
C.S. Lewis: A Life — Alister McGrath
Becoming C.S. Lewis: A Biography of Young Jack Lewis — Harry Lee Poe
The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C.S. Lewis — Alan Jacobs
For more on Flora Lewis and how her death impacted C.S. Lewis, don’t miss our read-along of The Magician’s Nephew that starts this Friday. To participate in the full chapter-by-chapter experience, become a paid subscriber.
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Flora rejected Albert’s first marriage proposal in 1886 and put him off for years before finally accepting. In 1893, she wrote to him: “I wonder do I love you? I am not quite sure. I know that at very least I am fond of you, and that I should never think of loving anyone else.” Flora Hamilton, quite the romantic.
The observation about Aslan's tears being bigger than Digory's really lands when framed as what convinced Digory to trust. Lewis seems to be working through that himself, trusting in a God who weeps. The parallel between magic (power/compulsion) vs faith is really teh core tension, not just in fiction but in how we handle grief.