Christian History Home > Issue 78 > Tollers & Jack
Tollers & Jack
Tolkien and Lewis made an odd couple, but the contributed profoundly to each other's work.
Colin Duriez | posted 4/01/2003 12:00AM
No harm in him: only needs a smack or two."
So wrote C. S. Lewis ("Jack" to his friends) in his diary the night he first met J. R. R. Tolkien ("Tollers"). The comment hints at the undercurrent of tension that would run beneath the pair's stream of mutual admiration.
The two differed in temperament, approach to faith, and views of their art. But their deep affinities brought them together for nearly 40 years of friendship.
During those years, Tolkien and Lewis spurred each other to write some of the most beloved books of the twentieth century. The Chronicles of Narnia and The Lord of the Rings. Mere Christianity and The Hobbit. Each owed much to their authors' mutual inspiration and critique.
...
Tolkien was slight of build, compared with the thickset and taller Lewis. He was also, at least in Lewis's view, rather opinionated (hence the need for a "smack").
The reality of imagination
Some of Tolkien's strongest opinions arose out of his Roman Catholicism. At that time Lewis was still an atheist, ...
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