was not just with his father; there is evidence that he could be less than immediate with his students—some describing him as being belligerent at times.98 As a tutor he was occasionally perceived as a bully because of his perhaps too enthusiastic application of his debating skills. He famously did not respond charitably to John Betjeman, a student of Lewis’s who eventually became the beloved Poet Laureate of England. He found Betjeman immature, unprepared, and non-responsive.99 Rather than modeling grace and an understanding of how students can often be impertinent, Lewis’s verbal and nonverbal behavior did not always demonstrate grace. I once met an elderly couple in Oxford who had both been tutored by Lewis. They said that although they thought Lewis was brilliant, he could be tediously exacting as a tutor and sometimes unnecessarily harsh with students—although, they added, only with those whom he thought could take pointed criticism. So perhaps Lewis thought Betjeman could take his criticism.
George Bailey, an American student of Lewis’s, observed that as a tutor Lewis was “interesting, colourful and lively” but then added, “but he was not a good teacher.”100 Bailey’s personal perception was that “Lewis lacked the warmth to fire his students with enthusiasm.”101 In addition, Lewis apparently sometimes couldn’t figure out who was who. Bailey notes, “Lewis consistently mistook me for Geoff Dutton, an Australian and an excellent student, and Dutton for me.”102 Yet Bailey found a benefit in the mislabeling: “For three years I basked in my misgiven status of a talented dominionite while Dutton groaned in durance vile as the only American in the college—if not, indeed, in the university—with the temerity to read English.”103 Bailey added, “Lewis credited Dutton’s performances to me and penalized Dutton for mine.”104
A few colleagues not in his inner circle reportedly perceived Lewis as impersonal. Lewis researcher Stephanie Derrick, after reviewing Lewis’s perception among some of his colleagues, concluded that Lewis could sometimes be “a divisive person in the cultural life of his peers.”105 She explains his sometimes “negative critiques” from his colleagues “in light of Lewis’s persona of aggressive bravado and his platform as someone who looked back, to the authorities and ←17 | 18→sensibilities of a past age.”106 Although, it should be noted, Derrick’s description of Lewis has not been uniformly supported by other Lewis scholars. Lewis author and scholar James Spencer notes, “Derrick’s insinuations are poorly supported by a fair reading of Lewis’ voluminous correspondence, the common witness of a wide range of his friends and even critical biographers …”107
Yet one former Lewis student confirms Derrick’s conclusions about his relationship with his colleagues. George Bailey concludes, “Lewis was not popular among his fellow dons. My impression was that he kept almost as aloof from dons as from undergraduates.”108 Although Bailey suggests the underlying reason for the perception of relational coolness may have been jealousy and the fact that Lewis wrote books about Christianity: “The lack of rapport between Lewis and the dons at Magdalen, on their side, was due not only to their envy of his fame but also to their distaste of the nature of his fame …”109 Bailey speculates, “As popularizer of Christian dogma, Lewis was embarrassing to the academic community.”110
Lewis’s friend Own Barfield noted that when Lewis was ready to end a conversation he would betray his boredom nonverbally. Barfield notes, “For casual acquaintances he had a peculiarly, perhaps deliberately, expressionless stare to show when the limit had been reached.”111 Famed zoologist Desmond Morris, who attended Magdalen College in Oxford and occasionally saw Lewis in the dining hall, told me Lewis could be standoffish and difficult to get to know well, often keeping to himself.112
Lewis also sometimes exhibited unusual, norm-violating, abrupt leave-taking cues. As reported in detailed notes, while meeting with some academics and publishers in the summer of 1955 at the Eastgate Hotel in Oxford about the possibility of Lewis serving as editor of a book series, Lewis was described as cordial, pleasant, and engaged in the conversation. Geoffrey Shepherd, a member of the editorial board for a publication for which they wanted Lewis to serve as General Editor, summarized the conversation as follows: “… we found ourselves talking about Tolkien and fairy stories and ancient Egyptians. We got rather noisy too and I saw a pale-faced solitary drinkers pressed back all round the sides of the room as if they were expecting an explosion.”113 While in the middle of the conversation Shepherd noted, “… then suddenly at five to one CS stood up, wrapped himself up, shook hands and suddenly shot off like a cork out of a bottle.”114 When it was time for Lewis to leave there was no pleasantries or dithering. Lewis simply left. Lewis had the same exiting approach when ending his academic lectures. Often, at the conclusion of an academic talk he would edge toward the door, pick up his hat and coat, and, while delivering his closing line, leave the ←18 | 19→lecture hall thus concluding the lecture and avoiding any questions or post-lecture conversations.115
It is easy for books about Lewis to be labeled mere hagiography, providing praise and adulation without noting his faults. Although Lewis was popular, professional, and professor of communication principles, he was also very human. He did not always demonstrate effective communication applications with his family, students, or some of his acquaintances. Yet perhaps his authentic struggles and challenges in his own personal and professional life helped him empathically connect with those who heard his lectures and broadcasts or read his works. C. S. Lewis was not a perfect communicator. In part because of his own grappling with the challenges of making human connections, he understood and applied principles of human communication that help explain his popularity, prolific output, and professional acumen.
HI TEA: A Preview of Lewis’s Communication Lessons
In the next chapter we will look more closely at Lewis’s life to provide a context for understanding Lewis as communicator. Many of his early experiences were traumatic. The death of his mother when he was nine, the series of inept boarding schools he attended, and his brief, harrowing foray into World War I were life-challenging experiences that influenced both the content of his messages and the way he connected to others. He knew pain and thus he could write about its problem. He observed grief yet wrote about Joy surprising him. Perhaps it is his own, sometimes eccentric but always interesting, life that continues to add to his mystique. Lewis lived a compartmentalized life in the sense that few people saw the “complete Lewis.” He had secrets. He kept his marriage to Joy Davidman hidden from his friend J. R. R. Tolkien for a period of time. Michael Ward develops the widely-supported theory of Lewis’s compartmentalization based on the fact that Lewis embedded a theme within The Chronicles of Narnia. Lewis, argues Ward, wanted to make this hidden theme implicit to all
