A beautiful passage from the book I am reading now – ‘Till We Have Faces’ by C.S.Lewis. It is a retelling of the love story of Psyche and Cupid. I am reading this as part of the ‘Read-a-Myth’ challenge hosted by Jo from ‘Bibliojunkie’ and Bina from ‘If You Can Read This’.
Of Psyche’s beauty – at every age the beauty proper to that age – there is only this to be said, that there were no two opinions about it, from man or woman, once she had been seen. It was beauty that did not astonish you till afterwards when you had gone out of sight of her and reflected on it. While she was with you, you were not astonished. It seemed the most natural thing in the world. As the Fox delighted to say, she was “according to nature”; what every woman, or even every thing, ought to have been and meant to be, but had missed by some trip of chance. Indeed, when you looked at her you believed, for a moment, that they had not missed it. She made beauty all round her. When she trod on mud, the mud was beautiful; when she ran in the rain, the rain was silver. When she picked up a toad – she had the strangest and, I thought, unchanciest love for all manner of brutes – the toad became beautiful…I wanted to be a wife so that I could have been her real mother. I wanted to be a boy so that she could be in love with me. I wanted her to be my full sister instead of my half sister. I wanted her to be a slave so that I could set her free and make her rich.
– From ‘Till We Have Faces’ by C.S.Lewis
Yay, glad you’re such an avid myth reader 🙂 This book sounds great, another one I hadn’t heard of before.
I love mythology 🙂 Thanks for hosting the ‘Read-a-Myth’ challenge, and giving me a reason to read more mythology books 🙂 This book is nice till now. I love the narrator and her voice. Though these days C.S.Lewis seems to be more popular for his Narnia series, his literary output seems to be considerable and this looks like one of his lost gems. I can’t wait to explore his other books too.
I hadn’t heard of this myth or retelling, but what a fantastic quote! Glad you shared.
Glad to know that you liked the quote, Amy 🙂 Hope you get to read this book. The narrator is a strong and intelligent woman and the book is quite good till now.
I remember her when studying mythology in high school and college. What a lovely description!
Glad to know you liked the passage, Linda 🙂 The book is wonderful till now.
I read this book for my book group a few years ago and I think I was going through a cranky reader phase because I didn’t care for it much at all. This was before I started blogging, so I think my tastes weren’t as developed as they are now! 😀
Sorry to know that you didn’t like this book much, when you tried reading it the first time, Steph. I have read one-third of it, and I am liking it till now. There is an interesting twist that happened in the story before I left off yesterday, and so I can’t wait to find out today what happened! Hope you will think of giving it another try 🙂
Thanks for the mention Vishy. I saw the title before but didn’t know it’s about psyche and cupid. I always wanted to read something by CS Lewis, if it’s not Narnia or his Christian writings, perhaps this will be the first I will pick up. 🙂
Thanks for hosting this challenge, Jo 🙂 It is making me read more books on mythology 🙂 This book is really good till now. Hope you get to read it sometime. C.S.Lewis also wrote some science fiction, in case you are interested.
I am dying to read this. C. S. Lewis is one of my favorite people (notwithstanding his appalling misogyny on some occasions) and this looks like a particularly excellent book.
I loved your comment about the contradictions of C.S.Lewis, Jenny 🙂 Hope you enjoy reading this book. It is wonderful till now!
This is one of my favourite myths ever, which makes me wonder why I’ve yet to read this! Actually, it might have been my occasional grumpiness at Lewis, but I’m much better in that regard since reading The Magician’s Book 😛
Nice to know that this is one of your favourite myths, Ana. Hope you get to read this book and like it. I would love to hear your thoughts on it. Everyday I want to read ‘The Magician’s Book’ more and more 🙂
beautiful. i especially like “She made beauty all round her.” that beauty is something that can transcend a person and affect her surroundings.
Glad you liked the passage, Monica 🙂 I like the way you have interpreted that sentence.
What an excellent quote you posted here. I love C. S. Lewis, but I have to admit that this book didn’t strike at my heart. Perhaps I needed more of the original myth as background? I felt like I’d missed the point when I closed the cover. Still, I’m glad that I’ve read most everything Lewis has written. I respect him so much.
Glad to know that you liked that passage, Bellezza 🙂 I haven’t read any of C.S.Lewis’ books other than the Chronicles of Narnia before. After reading ‘Till We Have Faces’ I am thinking of exploring more of his works. As you are a C.S.Lewis connoisseur, I will ask you this – which of his other books would you recommend? Which of them are your favourites?