If you are looking for the beginning of the study for C. S. Lewis’ Till We Have Faces then you can go HERE for a brief introduction. At the bottom of the introduction you will find the links to each section of the study guide as it becomes available. If you would like to see the growing list of book studies available for free on this site you can go HERE. Enjoy!
Virtues/Vices/Great Ideas: (Find these in the Text and Note them in the Margins)
Superstition, Recklessness, Despotism, Love, Expectation vs. Reality, Joy, Beauty, Fear
Grammar Questions: (The Information of the Text)
Why could Orual say “very little” about her father’s second wife?
What had Orual begun to call “the Fox” besides “the Fox?”
What happened to the boy who slipped in the blood while bringing the king his wine?
What did the priest say in response to King Trom’s accusations against Ungit?
What did the king say he was going to do with the Fox?
What did Orual beg the Fox to do?
What did the Fox want to do instead of Orual’s suggestion?
What occurred which suddenly changed the state of things for the Fox?
What did the king realize the Fox could do “better than any man in Glome?”
Once Orual realized the Fox was safe, at least for now, what was the first thing she went to do?
How is Psyche described by Orual?
Logic Questions: (Interpreting, Comparing/Contrasting, Reasoning)
What did the Fox mean when he said “We must learn, child, not to fear anything that nature brings?”
For what reason might they have offered a sacrifice during the time Orual had fallen asleep?
What did the king mean when he told the priest, concerning Ungit, “You had better recover what she owes me?”
Why might the Priest have been “not in the least afraid of the king” even in light of what he had just done to the servant boy?
Why would the king have asked about “the body of the dead boy…’Who did that?’”
What did the king mean by saying “Girls, girls, girls!...Is there a plague of girls in heaven that the gods send me this flood of them?”
What was Orual getting at when she said, “They say that those who go that way lie wallowing in filth – down there in the land of the dead?”
What might we infer about the Fox from his statement “At death we are resolved into our elements” and also from the fact that Orual pointed out that he was “trembling?”
What might the Fox have meant by referring to “the god within me?”
Orual said “The Fox was a true Greek; where my father could give only a Yes or a No to some neighbouring king or dangerous noble, he could pare the Yes to the very quick and sweeten the No till it went down like wine. He could make your weak enemy believe that you were his best friend and make your strong enemy believe you were twice as strong as you really were.” What might have made him able to do these things so well?
What did the Fox mean when he said, of Psyche, “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?”
Orual said, concerning Psyche, “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.” How do you think C. S. Lewis intended his readers to feel when he wrote these words?
Why was Orual fearful of the Fox’s words about Psyche’s beauty, saying that she was “prettier than Andromeda, prettier than Helen, prettier than Aphrodite herself?”
What did the Fox mean when he said, “The Divine Nature is not like that?”
Rhetoric Questions: (The Analysis of Ideas in the Text)
Define the concept of “superstition.” What are some examples of superstition in this reading? Some people would argue that superstition and religion are synonymous, do you agree or disagree? If you agree, explain why they are essentially the same. If you disagree what distinctions ought to be made between them.
The Fox said to Orual “Have I not told you often that to depart from this life of a man’s own will when there’s good reason is one of the things that are according to nature?” Is taking one’s own life really “according to nature?” Do you think a person is ever justified in ending their own life under certain circumstances or do you think no one should ever do this? Explain and defend your perspective persuasively.
We are told that Redival “promised to have beauty enough, but not like Psyche’s.” How can one person be more beautiful than another? By what standard do we judge whether one person is more beautiful than another? Is one person more beautiful than another in the same way that we might say one person is closer to the state of Kansas than another? Is beauty a thing that has its own existence and which we may get closer to or further from? What is the right way to think about this?
We read that Psyche “made beauty all around 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…the toad became beautiful.” Is beauty actually infectious in this way or is this merely poetic license? Can we, or other things, be made more beautiful by being in the presence of someone truly beautiful? Why or why not?
Theological Analysis: (Sola Scriptura)
Read 2 Peter 1:16-21. How does this passage of Scripture help us delineate (distinguish) between true religion and superstition?
Read 1 Corinthians 3:16-17. How might we relate this passage of Scripture to the second Rhetoric question?
Read Psalm 27:4 and Psalm 96:1-6. How do these passages touch on the matter of beauty and its source/origin?
How does 1 Peter 3:1-6 and Romans 10:14-15 address the question of beauty?