Most readers know their books and the genre they propagated, which has launched scores of films, podcasts, games and toys. But how many fans knew that C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien were good friends who spent much of their time together arguing the spiritual pursuits of humankind? John Hendrix, a graphic novelist who is an extraordinary biographer (a novel graphicist), has created a new form of graphic—comic—book, The Mythmakers, in which he uses “a dual biography as an avatar for telling a deeper story about the origins of fairy tales.” Below we talk about his relationship to Lewis, Tolkien and their shared religious beliefs.
What triggered your interest in C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, aside from them being popular fantasy authors and “Mythmakers”?
This book comes primarily from the great debt that I owe to Lewis and Tolkien. I write in the book that their works shaped my early life so significantly that I doubt I will ever be able to escape their influence. The way they saw the world validated my imagination and carved deep grooves in my heart and mind. Their work and their faith wrestled with the notions of purpose, myth and, of course, dragons.
Can you explain the structure of your book? It is about a “fellowship,” but it is also about a quest.
The story, in title, is about C.S. Lewis and J.R.R Tolkien, but I am really using a dual biography as an avatar for telling a deeper story about the origins of fairy tales, the meaning of myth in the history of the human story. Yes, this book is a quest! Historically, the two greatest themes inside of ancient myth were war and quest. In crafting this book, I wanted to build a structure where the book itself was a quest and not just a biography.
You state that, “they longed to make stories like the ones they loved. But their quarry was much more elusive.” What was their quarry? Was it simply “joy”?
The thing that drew Lewis and Tolkien together initially was their love of Norse mythology. But underneath the love of those stories was a longing for something they could not put their finger on. They would say most of us feel it when we read a great story. C.S. Lewis called this longing for longing by the German word “sehnsucht.” Lewis said this: “Joy is distinct not only from pleasure in general but even from aesthetic pleasure. It must have the stab, the pang, the inconsolable longing.” And Tolkien described joy as a feeling that reaches “beyond the walls of our world.” Both of these authors came to believe that stories and fairy tales allow humanity to access truths that are unknowable in any other way.
Lewis was a very devout Christian. But his mission was to inform doubters in God. How did this emerge in his work?
As readers will learn in the book, both Tolkien and Lewis came from a deeply Christian worldview. In fact it was Tolkien that showed C.S. Lewis the first pathway to break through his atheism—to consider God not just a logical possibility, but ultimately the one true narrator of the human story. After World War I, Lewis was a staunch atheist who was quite cynical about the world, and yet it was in the reading of fairy tales where he felt the most joy! He could not square the circle of his own love of stories, (which in his mind were “lies but breathed through silver”) and that of the stark realities of a materialist world. When he met Tolkien, he found a mentor he admired who quickly became a close friend who had a sober and reasonable belief in God and the supernatural.
To tell the story of Lewis and Tolkien, you must understand their shared faith. While they were different in the sense that Tolkien was a Catholic and Lewis was an Anglican, What they shared was a belief in being a part of a greater story. In the book I talk about this pivotal conversation that Lewis and Tolkien had on Addison’s Walk, on the grounds of Oxford in September of 1929. They talked for hours, late into the night, about the nature of story, myth and God. The title of my book, The Mythmakers, is a reference to this pivotal moment. Tolkien famously convinced Lewis that humanity writes myths, not because we long to be told comforting lies, but because our hearts were created by a Mythmaker. “We make in the manner in which we were made,“ Tolkien said. This single notion was the turning of the key in Lewis’ heart. It allowed him to write the rest of his works. Scholar Alan Jacob says that Lewis was convinced that the Christian story was true not by a set of facts but by “learning to read a story the right way.”
How did Lewis’ work differ from Tolkien’s?
Their works shared much, but also were very different. They were also very different creators in terms of process. Lewis’ works are more immediate, less interested in the fidelity of perfect world-building. He also wrote fast. Many times his works would be completed in a single draft. He also became fascinated with popular apologetics. It seemed that Lewis’s theological works were aimed at demystifying theology. His writings often took the great moral and spiritual questions and turned them into the kinds of things you could talk about over a pint at the Eagle and Child.
Their relationship was fraught at times. Lewis did not tell Tolkien about his marriage, for instance. What was the tension between them?
Yes, their story is both a triumph and a tragedy. They did suffer a falling out over the years they knew each other. Some of it is, in my opinion, attributable to older British men who did not often talk about their feelings together. They did grow apart on some theological issues, related to Lewis marrying Joy Davidman. But mostly, Tolkien was hurt because Lewis didn’t tell him he had married! Lewis didn’t tell him because he feared it would disappoint Tolkien (who as a Catholic was not agreeable to divorce), as Joy was divorced from her first husband, who was physically abusive. They did still support one another, and Lewis’ sudden death rocked Tolkien to the core. I think they ended their lives with regret as to how their story concluded.
We’ll let the reader discover the true grit of this remarkable story themselves. But did you have a favorite character? How did you feel after your time spent in their lives?
I feel great affection for both of them. I owe them so much, and it is hard to not feel like you know them when you have read so many of their letters, spent time in their homes, and visited their graves. I have a particular affinity for Lewis, as his works were so important to my own faith. In my own books, I have a clear focus on taking complex stories and translating them to younger audiences. I feel like Lewis did much the same with his works like The Problem of Pain and Mere Christianity.
To make this book, I believe you did more investigating and research than in your other projects. Am I right?
Yes, there is always so much reading, but this had twice as much with two subjects. The goal is to take it all in and find a form that is understandable. All these books require curation. Leaving things out is harder than putting them in! Mythmakers was written and designed for young minds—middle-grade and young-adult audiences. As I said, with all my work, I desire legibility. My own brain loves when complicated things are made clear. I use words and images to translate stories to a curious audience. The research is critical, but then you have to know how to format it so that it isn’t too much, and also doesn’t leave a reader feeling like you’ve whitewashed challenging issues.
How did you feel during the making of the work? And how long did it take to feel comfortable enough to do such a massive project?
This is such a tough question to ask. During any kind of project that takes five years, you go through many cycles of emotions. There were times that it felt too long, or too obscure. There are also times when I was just so excited to be making these images. I couldn’t wait to share it with others, and now the book is finally (almost!) in the hands of actual readers.
The structure of the book is, well, something more than a “graphic novel”—it’s a visual language in its own right. What factors went into deciding how you would create Mythmakers?
At one point I suggested to Abrams that we should not call my books graphic novels but “Novel-Graphics” in that they almost subvert the normal relationship between comics and text. I often describe my format as both 100% words and 100% pictures at the same time. There are passages of prose, comics, maps, illustrations, and lots of drawn lettering. In many ways, I’m making a book for the 12-year-old version of myself. This is how I tend to learn and retain information, when there is a blended language of word and image on the same page.
I’ve got to ask. Why do you have the lion and sorcerer as the guides of this story?
These two came about both as a practical matter and also a simple problem of entertainment. When you’re telling a richly visual story in graphic novel form about two professors at Oxford, the fact is that most of what they did together was mostly sitting around and talking. Which makes for an extremely boring comic book. So these two avatar figures allowed me to inject a bit more physical adventure into the book. Thanks to Lion and Wizard, the reader gets to take some of the things that Lewis and Tolkien were talking about and put them into practice.
How does humor play a role in this book?
It was great fun writing the dialogue for both Lewis and Tolkien and Lion and Wizard. I grew up with a deep obsession with Monty Python, Red Dwarf and Faulty Towers. But I realized I did not want to be writing fan fiction that sounded like a bad Blackadder parody, so I made sure to find a friend in England (the amazing illustrator Sophie Killingley) who could review my dialogue to make sure that it sounded possible coming out of a 1940s Oxford professor. But, yes, outside of “The Holy Ghost” comics, this is probably the funniest book I’ve tried to write.
Are you pleased with the outcome?
Most people may know the basic shape of Lewis and Tolkien’s story. Yes, they were colleagues at Oxford, but most don’t realize how essential their fellowship became. Each man gave the other the precise gift needed to complete their own story. Tolkien gave Lewis the freedom to love his imagination. Lewis gave Tolkien sheer encouragement, without which he never would have completed the 17-year journey of writing Lord of the Rings. In the end, I hope readers learn something about fellowship, and that our work always gets better in community. I’m pleased to see it made in such a beautiful format by Abrams Fanfare, and I do hope readers enjoy it—I poured my heart into it.