by C.S. Lewis

Spirits in Bondage is C.S. Lewis’s first book and the first of his works to be available in the public domain. It was released in 1919 under the pseudonym of Clive Hamilton and was written in a period of darker thought for C.S. Lewis than was later evidenced in his Christian apologist writings.The darkness of the verse is most evident in Part One (The Prison House), begins to change in the short transitional Part Two (Hesitation) and attains a more hopeful tone in the final Part Three (Escape). Yet a dreamy effect, influenced by Celtic and Druid mythology, persists throughout.

Spirits in Bondage consists of forty poems that provide an intriguing insight into the youthful heart of C.S. Lewis and occasionally provides interesting lyrical foreshadowing of some of the landscapes portrayed in his famous Chronicles of Narnia series. Summary by Robert Garrison

Read by Robert Garrison

 excerpts :

"Open the gates for me,/ Open the gates of the peaceful castle, rosy in the West,/ In the sweet dim Isle of Apples over the wide sea's breast,/ Open the gates for me!"

"For I know that the colourless skies/ And the blurred horizons breed/ Lonely desire and many words and brooding and never a deed."

 Approx play time 75 mins