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Copywork
About This Passage
This passage rewards close attention to syntax and image. The long opening sentence turns on the contrast not Who are you? but So it was you all the time, and the metaphor of central music that had always just evaded memory captures the whole idea of recognition. Copying it trains a student to handle subordination, parallel structure, and a sustained metaphor.
But when he saw them he knew that he had always known them and realised what part each one of them had played at many an hour in his life when he had supposed himself alone, so that now he could say t...
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Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
Summarize this final letter, then explain what you think Lewis most wanted the reader to feel as the man passes from terror to recognition and joy. What techniques does Lewis use to achieve that effect?
Discussion Questions
- Screwtape is enraged that the man 'got through so easily,' with 'sheer, instantaneous liberation' and 'no false hopes of life.' Why does the suddenness of the death matter so much to Screwtape's account of his own defeat? Use details from the letter to Wormwood to develop your answer.
- When the man meets the shining ones he greets them with 'So it was you all the time,' and finds 'that central music in every pure experience which had always just evaded memory' now 'recovered.' What does this moment of recognition suggest about the man's whole life, and why might Lewis place it at the very end? Use details from the letter to Wormwood.
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Vocabulary Builder
Item 1
A firm, settled belief held with certainty.
Item 2
The mind's power to reason and understand.
Item 3
A comparison that explains one thing by its likeness to another.
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Critical Thinking
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