Mark Studdock's Heroism: Another Look at <I>That Hideous Strength</I>

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Mark Studdock's Heroism: Another Look at <I>That Hideous Strength</I> Volume 22 Number 2 Article 5 1998 Mark Studdock's Heroism: Another Look at That Hideous Strength Darci Hill Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore Part of the Children's and Young Adult Literature Commons Recommended Citation Hill, Darci (1998) "Mark Studdock's Heroism: Another Look at That Hideous Strength," Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: Vol. 22 : No. 2 , Article 5. Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol22/iss2/5 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Mythopoeic Society at SWOSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature by an authorized editor of SWOSU Digital Commons. An ADA compliant document is available upon request. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To join the Mythopoeic Society go to: http://www.mythsoc.org/join.htm Mythcon 51: A VIRTUAL “HALFLING” MYTHCON July 31 - August 1, 2021 (Saturday and Sunday) http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-51.htm Mythcon 52: The Mythic, the Fantastic, and the Alien Albuquerque, New Mexico; July 29 - August 1, 2022 http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-52.htm Abstract Examines Mark Studdock’s heroism in learning to be virtuous, in exercising the four cardinal and three Christian virtues. Additional Keywords Heroism; Lewis, C.S.—Characters—Mark Studdock; Lewis, C.S. That Hideous Strength; Virtues (Cardinal) in literature; Virtues (Christian) in literature This article is available in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol22/iss2/5 P a g e 2 2 I s s u e 84 S u m m e r 1998 MYTHLORE M a r k S t u d d o c k 's H e r o i s m : A n o t h e r L o o k a t T h a t H i d e o u s S t r e n g t h D a r c i H i l l Lewis's concept of heroic conduct is not a new one; lit­ suffering, which ends in his being reconciled through re­ erature possesses the characteristics of a long heroic pentance (Kurth 31). Closely related to the Renaissance con­ tradition that is often connected with the word humanism. cept of the hero, this seventeenth-century concept empha­ Entering England as it did through the court and the uni­ sizes the individual personality and a balance between versity, the term itself implies "thought and training more thinking and doing, between the spiritual and the physical than... spontaneous emotion, or borrowing from Italy, world. Too, the writers of both eras strive for the ideal or the France, and Germany more than... native impulse" (Baugh perfect in their hero portrayals (Kurth 34). 326). As one becomes aware of Lewis's background and of From Baker's point of view, during the latter part of the his imaginative, critical, and theological writings, he real­ seventeenth century John Dry den, with his emphasis izes how fully aware of the tradition Lewis actually is. But upon reason over emotion or cold rationality over ideal­ it is in order first, to explore the tradition by considering ized sentiments, paves the way for the eighteenth- other approaches to it, if only to affirm the general tradi­ century concept of the hero. Thus evolves a satirical, liter­ tion in which Lewis wrote. ary anti-hero, which writers employ to initiate social and Ernest A. Baker, an established literary historian, as­ political reform. Examples of the often vicious satire used serts that the GrecoRoman concept of the hero is not only are Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels and A Modest Pro­ that of a man who possesses inherent ability to protect and posal and Alexander Pope's Dunciad. The Romantics of the lead but also a man who possesses innate nobility and vir­ later eighteenth and early nineteenth century rebel against tue (1:66). The concept in turn is fused with similar Teu­ what they see as the cold reason of Dryden and his con­ tonic and Hebraic concepts. As several critics point out, an temporaries in an extreme about-face manner. They stress early picture of the fusion is seen in Nordic literature. For emotion, imagination, and the individual, thus reopening example, in Beowulf, an Anglo-Saxon epic poem, the hero the way in literature for the idealistic concept of the hero. is portrayed as a noble protector of his people as he Too, the chivalric code for heroes is again established by emerges victor of the battle against Grendel, the vicious Sir Walter Scott in works such as Ivanhoe (Baker 6:330). man-eating monster, and against Grendel's mother. Sev­ In the Victorian age, Thomas Carlyle in On Heroes and eral critics also establish that the Arthurian legends of the Hero-Worship sets the m easure for the hero of the late nine­ early medieval period emphasize the dauntless courage teenth century. The first principle he sets down, among the and bravery of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round traits of every hero, is that great men possess an innate, Table as they protect their kingdom from invasions, their overwhelming concern for their fellow man: womenfolk from danger, and their pure religion from harmful influences. Also, as evidence of their virtue, sev­ I should say sincerity, a deep, great, genuine sincerity is eral of the knights seek the Holy Grail, a quest requiring the first characteristic of all men in any way heroic. The great undying faith and pureness of heart. Another concept gen­ man's sincerity is of the kind he cannot speak of, is not con­ scious of... yet he cannot help being sincere! The great fact of erally accepted is that the Arthurian legends probably led existence is great to him. wonderful, real as death, is this uni­ to the chivalric code of the latter Middle Ages which con­ verse to him (52). sists of a respect for women, sometimes involving a glorifi­ cation of womanhood, as expected in the cult of the Virgin, Carlyle further asserts that the primary responsibility of and an observance of the cardinal and Christian virtues the hero is, through bravery and valor, to protect the peo­ (Baker, et al). ple; for of course he must be the ablest and also the "truest- hearted, justest, the Noblest man" (Carlyle 251). Hence, One may next observe the contributions of the Renais­ the hero naturally is God-appointed, his greatest destiny sance. In that age there abound courtesy books-----such as being the healer and savior of mankind: Castiglione’s The Courtier, Lily's Euphues, Heroism, the precedent is established that the hero's worth can be meas­ The great man, with his free force direct out of God's own ured by his ability to combat evil both on the physical and hand, is the lightning. His word is the wise healing word spiritual plane. His genuine strength, though, is tested which all can believe in... The Great Man is the indispensable savior of his epoch (Carlyle 10). through temptation or a moral decision he is forced to make. In most of the Christian epics, especially in Paradise Now it is quite apparent, and it is so mainly through his Lost, the hero succumbs to the temptation and to the fall own works, that C. S. Lewis fully understands and leans from grace. He usually then goes through a period of great heavily on this humanistic tradition — this tradition of the P a g e 24 I s s u e 84 S u m m e r 1 998 MYTHLORE Great M an— in portraying the hero in his space trilogy. To his emotional and spiritual development even though his test this affirmation, one may well compare the facts vari­ reasons for not bringing her are selfish at the core: ously assembled above with parallel matters in Lewis's A l­ There were so many things that Jane would not understand: legory of Love, Discarded Image, and English Literature in the not only the pretty heavy drinking which was becoming his Sixteenth Century Excluding Drama.1 They include pru­ habit but—oh, everything from morning to night... he would dence, or practical common sense; temperance, or going to have found it impossible to conduct in her hearing any one of the right length in partaking of any kind of pleasure; jus­ the hundred conversations which his life at Belbury involved tice, or "the old name for everything we should now call (THS 194). 'fairness"' (62); and fortitude, or facing danger and bear­ The zenith of Mark's growing prudence may be ob­ ing pain. The first of the Christian or "theological" virtues, served in his first conversation with Frost in the cell, where as Lewis refers to them, is faith, which he defines on two he is held after being arrested for the murder of Hingest. levels: first, as a belief in or an acceptance of the Christian Frost has been expounding his "objective" views that "re­ doctrines, and second, as a complete dependence upon sentment and fear are both chemical phenomena" (THS God, "realizing the while "that everything given to God is 297), but Mark’s "new insight into Belbury kept him re­ already His" (111-12). The second virtue is hope, or a con­ solved not to believe one word Frost said, not to accept tinual anticipation of the eternal world, and charity, the (though he might feign acceptance) any offer he made" third is "that state of the will which we have naturally (THS 298).
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