Book Description
The Cosmic Trilogy is a remarkable work of fantasy, demonstrating the powerful imagination of C.S Lewis. Out of the Silent Planet: Dr Ransom, a Cambridge academic, is abducted and taken on a spaceship to the red planet of Malacandra, which he knows as Mars. His captors are plotting to plunder the planet's treasures and plan to offer Ransom as a sacrifice to the creatures who live there. Ransom discovers he has come from the 'silent planet' - Earth - whose tragic story is known throughout the universe... Perelandra: Dr Ransom is called to the paradise planet of Perelandra, or Venus, which turns out to be a beautiful Eden-like world. He is horrified to find that his old enemy, Dr Weston, has also arrived and is putting him in grave peril once more. As the mad Weston's body is taken over by the forces of evil, Ransom engages in a desperate struggle to save the innocence of Perelandra... That Hideous Strength: Newly-married Mark and Jane Studdock are drawn into events very far out of the ordinary. The morning after a horrific nightmare about a decapitated head, Jane sees the same face in a newspaper and has the growing feeling that she is being warned of something real and ominous. Meanwhile, Mark has been enticed to join the National Institute for Co-ordinated Experiments, which aims to control human society. As he is drawn into the sinister organization, he discovers the truth about his wife's dreams, while she seeks helps at a community called St Anne's, led by the charismatic Dr Ransom...
About the Author
Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast in 1898. He was a fellow and tutor in English Literature at Magdalen College, Oxford, and later was Professor of Medieval and Renaissance Literature at Cambridge University, where he remained until his death in 1963. He wrote numerous books of literary criticism and on Chistianity, the best-known being ‘The Screwtape Letters’, as well as four novels for adults.
Lewis (known as Jack to his friends) and his good friend J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, were part of the Inklings, an informal writers’ club that met at a local pub to discuss story ideas. Lewis’s fascination with fairy tales, myths and ancient legends, coupled with inspiration from his childhood, led him to write the seven Chronicles of Narnia. These were his only works for children, and they have become acknowledged classics of children’s literature. The best-known of these, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, began with a picture in Lewis’s head, at the age of 16, of a faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. It is now being made into a film by Walden Media, due for release in the latter part of 2005.
