August 25, 2008: Lewis on Writerly Courage - 0 Comments

"I know that we hear much of this kind of courage in publisher's advertisements; there every scribbler is 'daring' when he defies gods whom he does not believe in, or conventions that have no authority in the only circles he frequents. But had not 'courage' of this sort better be left to blurb-writers? For, to tell the truth, literary composition is not an employment that makes very heavy demands on this arduous virtue. What meditation on human fate demands so much 'courage' as the act of stepping into a cold bath? I should be glad to hear of it, for I know no path to heroism which sounds so suited to my own capacities."

- Lewis, The Personal Heresy (part V), 1939.