The Discarded Image

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The Discarded Image by C.S. Lewis has been on my shelf for several years. 

Last summer while I was talking to my beloved Latin teacher, I mentioned reading Stuart Isacoff’s Temperament.  I had found it fascinating how both the ancient and medieval thinker linked all of life together.  Thus the numbers and distances of the planets were thought to be the link between the distances and ratios of musical intervals.  Even though their facts weren’t always correct they were certainly significant.  They looked at the details of life as symbols for some other reality. 

“Carol,” my teacher said. “Have you read The Discarded Image?  That’s precisely what that book is about!”  The Image in the title refers to the Model of the Universe, “the medieval synthesis itself, the whole organisation of their theology, science, and history into a single, complex, harmonious mental Model of the Universe.” (p.11) We cannot read medieval works with modern or post-modern minds and really know what they meant without understanding how they thought.

The first chapter was glorious and exciting. But, I’ll be honest: it was a hard book to read.  The difficulty lay in my own ignorance.  There were so many unfamiliar references and background chapters to wade through.  So I went to the last chapter, The Influence of the Model, and read that.  Next, I dipped into sections which looked interesting and then began again.  What helped me persevere were the lovely little pearls that were scattered across the pages.

The [evil] influences do not work upon us directly, but by first modifying the air…Hence when a medieval doctor could give no more particular cause for the patient’s condition he attributed it to ‘this influence which is at present i the air.’  If he were an Italian doctor he would doubtless say questa influenza.  The profession has retained the useful word ever since. (p.110)

To medieval folk looking into a night sky was not looking at darkness but through darkness.  They believed that space was not dark, nor silent. 

The ‘silence’ which frightened Pascal was, according to the Model, wholly illusory; and the sky looks black only because we are seeing it through the dark glass of our own shadow.  You must conceive yourself looking up at a world lighted, warmed, and resonant with music.  (p.112)

This just made me smile:

One gets the impression that medieval people, like Professor Tolkien’s Hobbits, enjoyed books which told them what they already knew.  (p.200)

This book is worth the effort required in reading it.  After reading this book I guarantee that you will read Lewis’s children’s literature differently. 

Here is a diamond of a quote which you need to copy into your journal or commonplace book. 

Literature exists to teach what is useful,
to honour what deserves honour,
to appreciate what is delightful.
The useful, honorable, and
delightful things are superior to it:
it exists for their sake;
its own use, honour, or delightfulness
is derivative from theirs.
(p. 214)

7 thoughts on “The Discarded Image”

  1. Well, I WAS reading it but then I got distracted. Someone recommended Framely Parsonage so The Discarded Image languishes on the bedside table. But I will get to it before July. When I go to the Circe Conference I want to pretend to be well-read 🙂

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  2. I will copy that!  Thank you for explaining Lewis’s book, too.  I appreciate your explaining how you approached a difficult book…reading the first part, skipping to the end, and then perusing in between.  You’re a genius!
    I am aware that all these things are interconnected….I just dont have quite the breadth (and time) to pull it all together….and so, I read others who do, like you.
    There is a *major* in college now that didnt exist when I was in school:  American Studies in which the history is linked to the art, music, science, etc.   I think I would have liked that very much.
    Dana in GA

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  3. “I want to pretend to be well bred.” Cindy you were just born funny! I read Framley Parsonage this year, see http://www.xanga.com/magistramater/570637579/framley-parsonage.html and I would say it is a much easier and entertaining read. With multiple weddings coming up your brain waves are busy calculating BBQ and buying shoes. We are finite, after all. Dana, I’m no genius. I guess I just had to figure out the object of the book before I could make sense of the middle.

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  5. roflol………..I started to tease you about needing glasses, but that mix-up is obviously a typo…gigglebut then again it fits…dont we all want to seem well-bred as well 🙂
    Dana

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  6. Dana, I AM blind as a bat. I wear contacts (and reading glasses). At least *this* time I caught my error, but you know, don’t you, that I depend on you!And yes, we want to be well-bred but we usually don’t speak of it in polite society, tee hee!

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  7. Carol, It is now written in my journal, in a place for ready reference.  Thanks. And thank you also for Framely. I am on the second to the last chapter now!!! (As an incredible aside~ I miss your church!)

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