The life and work of C.S. Lewis after his conversion in 1931 is well known and his reputation shows no signs of diminishing. His earlier years have not been so well studied, particularly between the ages of 16 and 22 when he studied privately and at Oxford, served in the British army, was wounded in France, entered into his affair with Janie Moore, and wrote and published his first book of poems. To correct and augment the limited accounts of this period, Lewis’s life is presented with the general and specific background which makes it more meaningful, particularly as it throws light on his character. The romantic myth of him as a "soldier-poet" is dispelled, largely through an extensive review of the poems in "Spirits in Bondage" and the self-centered life that produced them. A valuable comparison—not to the advantage of Lewis—is drawn with two undoubted soldier-poets, Robert Graves and Siegfried Sassoon. The purpose is not to disparage or belittle Lewis but to show what had to be overcome in his limited and unpleasant early moral character in order to produce the devoted Christian of later years.
If you are a "fan" of the fantasy books by Tolkien, C.S.Lewis, Charles Williams or Chesterton, then this is a book worth reading. It is a collection of essays by various authorities in literature, myth and theology. A couple of the contributors were acquainted with either Tolkien or Lewis. The central thesis running through this collection of essays is that mythic symbols found in folk-tales and religious rituals, all express a common, fundamental human yearning for healing and a return to a "lost paradise". The essayists draw on insights from religious phenomenology, Jungian analysis, Christian theology and literary interpretation to tease out the potent mythic symbols found in the writings of Tolkien, Lewis, Chesterton and Williams. Lewis, Williams and Tolkien were associated with one another as drinking partners in an informal literary club known as The Inklings. The essayists "test" their thesis about the power of myth to reveal our search for meaning through the novels of the Inklings. The essayists take us a step further to consider the Christian world-view that informed and shaped the writings of Tolkien, Lewis, Williams and Chesterton. Although a couple of the essays are slightly "dated", anyone interested in fantasy literature would find the thesis very absorbing. It should be useful not merely to students of English literature but also to the general reader who might like to know more about the backdrop to The Lord of the Rings, Narnia, etc. Certainly a book to add to your list for reading if you enjoyed the novels!
The Spirit Flyer, a rusty old bicycle found in the city dump, surprises its new owner, John Kramar, when it magically lives up to its name, introducing John to an unknown world and changing his life for good.
Writing reliable and maintainable C++ software is hard. Designing such software at scale adds a new set of challenges. Creating large-scale systems requires a practical understanding of logical design – beyond the theoretical concepts addressed in most popular texts. To be successful on an enterprise scale, developers must also address physical design, a dimension of software engineering that may be unfamiliar even to expert developers. Drawing on over 30 years of hands-on experience building massive, mission-critical enterprise systems, John Lakos shows how to create and grow Software Capital. This groundbreaking volume lays the foundation for projects of all sizes and demonstrates the processes, methods, techniques, and tools needed for successful real-world, large-scale development. Up to date and with a solid engineering focus, Large-Scale C++, Volume I: Process and Architecture, demonstrates fundamental design concepts with concrete examples. Professional developers of all experience levels will gain insights that transform their approach to design and development by understanding how to Raise productivity by leveraging differences between infrastructure and application development Achieve exponential productivity gains through feedback and hierarchical reuse Embrace the component’s role as the fundamental unit of both logical and physical design Analyze how fundamental properties of compiling and linking affect component design Discover effective partitioning of logical content in appropriately sized physical aggregates Internalize the important differences among sufficient, complete, minimal, and primitive software Deliver solutions that simultaneously optimize encapsulation, stability, and performance Exploit the nine established levelization techniques to avoid cyclic physical dependencies Use lateral designs judiciously to avoid the “heaviness” of conventional layered architectures Employ appropriate architectural insulation techniques for eliminating compile-time coupling Master the multidimensional process of designing large systems using component-based methods This is the first of John Lakos’s three authoritative volumes on developing large-scale systems using C++. This book, written for fellow software practitioners, uses familiar C++ constructs to solve real-world problems while identifying (and motivating) modern C++ alternatives. Together with the forthcoming Volume II: Design and Implementation and Volume III: Verification and Testing, Large-Scale C++ offers comprehensive guidance for all aspects of large-scale C++ software development. If you are an architect or project leader, this book will empower you to solve critically important problems right now – and serve as your go-to reference for years to come. Register your book for convenient access to downloads, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.
In the World equips readers to become better writers. It also introduces quality writing with forty classic and contemporary selections from writers such as Augustine, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, John Donne, Henri Nouwen, Philip Yancey, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Walter Wangerin Jr., and Charles Colson. This second edition contains a completely updated and revised rhetoric section and added contemporary essays that represent a broad range of ethnicity, gender, and point of view. Book jacket.
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