That Hideous Strength, Part II, on City of Man Podcast

The City of Man Podcast’s final episode on CS Lewis’s Space Trilogy, the second half of our discussion of That Hideous Strength, arrived earlier this week. In Part I, Coyle, David, and I introduced the novel, summarized the plot, and started talking about some of the subplots and themes in this rich and complicated book. We also talked about Mr. Bultitude—how could we not?

In this episode, we pick up with David’s examination of NICE’s system of programmatic degradation and alienation and continue to talk about the novel’s parallel dramatic structure, its themes of rightly ordered love and marriage, NICE’s Babel-like project and the eventual confusion of speech that wrecks it, violent animal attacks, and the final surreal cataclysm that swallows up NICE and the village of Edgestow (much to my delight). We also discuss a little more of the novel’s historical context—wondering what That Hideous Strength might have looked like if Lewis had written it just a few months later, after the debut of the atomic bomb—as well as the novel’s Arthurian content and whether it works with the rest of the story, and what exactly “that hideous strength” is. We also have a lot of reading to recommend, and one great YouTube channel.

You can catch up by listening to Part I of this episode here, or go even further back to listen to our chats about the first two books in the trilogy, Out of the Silent Planet and Perelandra.

You can listen to City of Man Podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, and other fine podcasting platforms, or to this particular episode of the show via the embedded Stitcher player in this post.

Thanks as always for listening! I had a great time revisiting this trilogy and talking it over with some sharp and insightful friends, and I hope y’all enjoy it as much as I did.