SURPRISED BY JOY. The Shape Of My Early Life.

First edition, first printing. Association copy. Original grey cloth with titles in silver over yellow on the spine, in the John R. Briggs designed dustwrapper. Top edge yellow. A very good copy, the binding firm although skewed, the cloth lightly toned to the spine and with some mottling to the lower board. The contents, with the ownership inscription of Leonard Blake on the front free endpaper and his sparse pencil notes and highlights to the margins throughout, are otherwise clean. Pages 196 and 197 have closed tears to the margins, seemingly a production fault. The closed text block edge has a fluid stain to the bottom corner (visible in some margins), and a little spotting. Complete with the lightly rubbed, nicked and marked dustwrapper that has a few short closed tears and mild toning of the spine. The flaps and underside are a little marked and spotted. Not price-clipped (15s on the front flap).

A philosophical partial autobiography beginning with the author's birth in 1898 and ending with his conversion to Christianity in 1931. Rather than being the focus of the book, the details of Lewis's life are given rather to provide context and support to the spiritual concept that he calls 'Joy'. Lewis describes 'Joy' as a beguiling and ephemeral feeling of longing that he first experienced as a child when remembering a toy garden and while reading Beatrix Potter's 'Squirrel Nutkin' and Longfellow's 'Saga of King Olaf', concluding that this feeling was guiding him to God and the Christian path. An excellent association copy. From the library of the author's friend Leonard James Blake. Blake was the husband of Maureen Moore (later Lady Dunbar of Hempriggs), one of the most significant figures in C. S. Lewis' life, a friend and surrogate sister with whom he lived for over 20 years. Maureen and Leonard Blake were married (with Lewis' encouragement) in 1940. Both teachers, Leonard was for more than two decades, the Director of Music at Malvern College (Lewis was educated at Malvern, and it is widely recognised that his time there, in particular the gas lamps and landscape, helped inspire the Chronicles of Narnia). Leonard and Maureen had two children, Lewis was godfather to their son Richard. They maintained a close friendship for the rest of Lewis' life. Leonard passed away in 1989 and Maureen in 1997, the final passages of 'The Last Battle' were read at her funeral.