The Great Divorce—Lewis

The Great Divorce*
(A fantastic bus ride from hell to Heaven—a round trip for some but not for others)
--C.S.Lewis
(MacMillan: 1946, 128pp.)

*Divorce: “a separation, especially one that is total or complete”

This is one of the strangest books I’ve ever read and I am hesitant to attempt a review. It is first of all an allegory but one staged with the minimum of context. From the start the reader is waiting with the first person narrator to discover where he is and where he is headed. The setting is some sort of run-down town in a dismal twilight zone. A scrappy collection of restless individuals are waiting for a bus to somewhere. The narrator joins them for want of anything more compelling to do.

Soon they are airborne and within a chapter’s space, have landed in a bright, large place, presumably outside our solar system. The bulk of the ‘storyline’ consists in conversations held or overheard, and in observations about the changing atmosphere and its effect on the passengers. As this new world of brilliant light is approached the faces take on ugly distortions of themselves—“full not of possibilities but of impossibilities”.
For the remainder of the book the reader accompanies the narrator in his exploration of this new place, which seems to be a sort of ‘trailhead’ to the path toward Heaven. The place they’ve come from seems to be a type of hell and it seems that this bus ride is their opportunity to determine if they are interested in proceeding or if they prefer to go back to hell.

I should clarify here, for those like myself who have a ‘problem’ with allegory in that it can paint a false picture of what is true: C.S. Lewis makes quite clear in his introduction that his imaginative suppositions of ‘transmortal’ conditions are purely fantasy and not to be construed as real speculation as to what will await us after death. Rather this sparsely detailed setting has given him a place to explore the mindsets of those who are hell-bound. The text is largely a matter of conversations and interactions observed by the narrator between the former bus occupants and the larger than life ‘real’ beings that inhabit this new world and are assigned to conduct those who are willing to Heaven.

Surprisingly, each one has an objection to going on to Heaven and one by one each chooses to retain the mindset that excludes him from Heaven and even to despise the thought of Heaven. The narrator is in a different category but I will not give away the clever story ending.

Each conversation represents a type of person whose way of thinking has misled them. There is the ‘intellectual’ who has dismissed all literal truth and feels entitled to his ‘honest opinion’, having drifted from faith and lost all sense of real reason in the process. Fact and God cannot not co-exist in his mind. When invited to ‘the land not of questions but of answers’ where he will ‘see the face of God’ his response is an air-headed “Ah, but we must all interpret those beautiful words in our own way! For me there is no such thing as a final answer. The free wind of inquiry must always continue to blow through the mind, must it not?”

Another character is the cynic who doubts everything and assumes everyone’s a liar and out to deceive him. A great depression has come over him and he is unable to believe that heaven is even a desirable destination, or hell one to be avoided. He has become a mocker beyond redemption.

Pride and pre-occupation with oneself is another obstacle typified. The thought of being seen for who she was terrifies this character. She despairs of having been born and cries, ‘What are we born for?’ The answer: “For infinite happiness”. But first there is the shame of being exposed for who we are. “If you will accept it—if you will drink the cup to the bottom—you will find it very nourishing.” She refuses the offer, not willing to be exposed.

In this way, C.S. Lewis presents much thought-provoking dialogue to demonstrate the nature of the choice that confronts every soul. At one point the narrator meets one of Lewis’ favorite authors, George MacDonald and discusses how souls could possibly choose to go back to hell. To this MacDonald replies:

“Milton was right, the choice of every lost soul can be expressed in the words ‘Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.’ There is always something they insist on keeping, even at the price of misery. There is always something they prefer to joy—that is, to reality.”

It is from this dialogue with MacDonald that the well-known quote emerges: “There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, ‘Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says, in the end, ‘Thy will be done.’ ” The extension of that quote is less well known but summarizes the moral of this story: “All that are in Hell, chose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. To those who knock it is opened.”(pp.72-73)


I encourage readers of all sorts to wade in and find these rich and insightful conversations, even if the fantasy genre is not your ‘cup of tea’. And bring along a pencil; there are too many good lines to leave unmarked!

--LS