Facsimile of 1937 Edition. In this provocative, classic metaphysical thriller, a group of suburban amateur actors plagued by personal demons and terrors explore the pathways to heaven and hell. Certain inhabitants of Battle Hill, a small community on the outskirts of London, are preparing to mount a new play by the neighborhood's most illustrious resident, the writer Peter Stanhope.

The key to Williams' mystically oriented theological thought, Descent into Hell is a multidimensional story about human beings who shut themselves up in their own narcissistic projections, so that they are no longer able to love, to 'co-inhere.' The result is a veritable hell.

Charles Williams took the form of the thriller and used it to create an extraordinary genre that has sometimes been called 'spiritual shockers.' His books are immensely worth reading, even if you consider yourself unspiritual and immune to shock.--Humphrey Carpenter.

..satire, romance, thriller, morality and glimpses of eternity all rolled into one. New York Times.

...one of the most gifted and influential Christian writers England has produced in this Century. Time

Reading Charles Williams is an unforgettable experience. Saturday Review.

Charles Williams always makes you stop and think deeply.

Charles Williams was a writer of unusual genius. He had an ability to make theological matters not merely interesting to the lay person; but to make them appear, what they in fact are, matters of Life and Death. His position is clear: The history of the church began an Pentecost and is the story of the operation of the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, on humanity. Williams reviews church history in terms of the action of the Holy Spirit, rather than the actions of humanity. The Descent of the Dove is a much needed supplement to traditional church histories.

Charles Walter Stansby Williams (1886 -1945) was a British poet, novelist, playwright, theologian and literary critic. He was a member of the Inklings and a reader for Oxford University Press.

There is nothing else that is like them or that could take their place. - T. S. Eliot

I have just read your Place of the Lion and it is to me one of the major literary events of my life ... There are layers and layers-first the pleasure that any good fantasy gives me: then, what is rarely (tho' not so very rarely) combined with this, the pleasure of a real philosophical and theological stimulus: thirdly, characters: fourthly, what I neither expected nor desired, substantial edification. - C. S. Lewis

I want to make clear that these novels of Williams ... are, first of all, very good reading.

To him [Williams] the supernatural was perfectly natural, and the natural was also supernatural. And this peculiarity gave him that profound insight into Good and Evil, into the heights of Heaven and the depths of Hell, which provides both the immediate thrill, and the permanent message of novels. Williams is telling us about a world of experience known to him ... he communicates this experience that he has had.

The Novels of Charles Williams is a collection of seven gripping novels. These supernatural thrillers are all set in the modern world but present human life as being controlled by unseen powers that operate at another level. In this respect, they are very similar to the Harry Potter series. The reader is shown that the supernatural is, in fact, perfectly natural, and exerts an influence on every aspect of our daily existence. On one level, these novels are gripping stories, but at another, they are a unique blend of fantasy, theology, morality and the supernatural which has not been surpassed, and which leave a deep impression on the reader.

Charles Williams was physically frail and for financial reasons never attended university; however, he had a vivid imagination and an inquiring mind. He was always interested in books, and after school he started life packing books but rose to be a proof-reader and then an editor at Oxford University Press; he was appointed a lecturer at Oxford University, and was even awarded an honorary M.A. by the university. As an author he was very versatile, writing novels, plays, poetry, popular theology, and academic works on literature. He was one of the Inklings, a group that included C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. One can see his influence on Lewis and Tolkien. Williams is most remembered for his novels which are collected in this omnibus edition.

This edition contains the seven novels War in Heaven, Many Dimensions, The Place of the Lion, The Greater Trumps, Shadows of Ecstasy, Descent into Hell, and All Hallows' Eve, and also the short story, Et in Sempiternum Pereant, which features the protagonist of Many Dimensions.

Charles Williams was one of the finest--not to mention one of the most unusual--theologians of the twentieth century. These two long essays make up, with The Descent of the Dove, Charles Williams' principal theological writing. With these books and with The Figure of Beatrice the reader is as fully equipped as possible for studying the religious thought of this brilliant poet, novelist, essayist and historian. His mysticism is palpable-the unseen world interpenetrates ours at every point, and spiritual exchange occurs all the time, unseen and largely unlooked for. His novels are legend, and as a member of the Inklings, he contributed to the mythopoetic revival in contemporary culture.

These pages must stand for what they are-a brief account of the history of that perverted way of the soul which we call magic, and with the reaction against it. No one will derive any knowledge of initiation from this boook. I have not wished to titillate or to thrill; so far as I can manage it, this is history, and accurate history. -adapted from the Preface Charles Williams was one of the finest-not to mention one of the most unusual-theologians of the twentieth century. His mysticism is palpable-the unseen world interpenetrates ours at every point, and spiritual exchange occurs all the time, unseen and largely unlooked for. His novels are legend, and as a member of the Inklings, he contributed to the mythopoetic revival in contemporary culture.

The key to Williams' mystically oriented theological thought, Descent into Hell (arguably Williams' greatest novel) is a multidimensional story about human beings who shut themselves up in their own narcissistic projections, so that they are no longer able to love, to 'co-inhere.' The result is a veritable hell.

The veil between the worlds has been torn, and terrible powers are coming through...

A magician has caused a rift in the fabric of the universe, and Platonic ideals are now roaming the English countryside, taking the form of giant animals and generally wrecking havoc on the small town of Smetham. While others flee, a young student name Anthony Durrant realizes that it is up to him to face down the monstrous powers before they destroy the world...

The Place of the Lion is one of Charles Williams' most beloved novels. C.S. Lewis called reading it, ...one of the major literary events of my life. Along with Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, Williams was member of the Inklings, an informal group of writers in Oxford, England who changed the world with their mythopoetic vision.

When Taliessin through Logres was published in 1938, it received widespread critical acclaim. Alongside its partner companion The Region of the Summer Stars, it stands as one of the most profound and challenging works in Williams' body of work--and one of the most important to understanding him fully. In this new edition, both Taliessin through Logres and The Region of the Summer Stars are found together, with a new introduction by Williams scholar S rina Higgins.

Taliessin through Logres is designed to reward multiple readings. The poetry is technically virtuosic, musically beautiful, and conceptually complex. It is densely packed with layers of symbolism and rich imagery that are not initially easy to understand, but that scintillate with ever greater brilliance upon repeated readings.
--from the Introduction by S rina Higgins

Some of the most fascinating poetry written in our time. Taliessin through Logres and The Region of the Summer Stars contain (Williams') Grail poems, a reworking of the theme of the Holy Grail into a poetic myth of unusual wisdom and contemporary significance. It is a unique handling, a fresh vision, of an old subject-matter which has been almost completely neglected in English literature.
--C.P. Crowley

The more I read Taliessin through Logres and The Region of the Summer Stars, the more rewarding I find them.... Charles Williams has his own mythology which a reader must master.
--W.H. Auden

One of the most ambitious essays in the interpretation of Dante our time has seen...his interpretation of the role of Beatrice is a subtle and individual one. Charles Williams was one of the finest-not to mention one of the most unusual-theologians of the twentieth century. His mysticism is palpable-the unseen world interpenetrates ours at every point, and spiritual exchange occurs all the time, unseen and largely unlooked for. His novels are legend, and as a member of the Inklings, he contributed to the mythopoetic revival in contemporary culture.

All Hallows' Eve is the last of the seven novels of the supernatural written by Charles Williams. Published by Faber and Faber in 1945, it went through three impressions that year and another in 1947. In 1948 it was published in the US by Pellegrini & Cudahy with an introduction by T. S. Eliot. There were two later translations into Italian and Spanish.

Glen Cavaliero has stated that the novels of Charles Williams, of which All Hallows' Eve is the last, move towards an ever more perfect fusion of natural with supernatural. The magical ceremonies that are meticulously described play a leading role in the plot's development and are not all the product of the author's imagination. T. S. Eliot, in his introduction to the American edition, raises the possibility that some may have been borrowed from the literature of the occult. Williams had, indeed, once belonged to A. E. Waite's Rosicrucian order, itself one of many offshoots of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Waite's order, however, was predominantly directed towards Christian mysticism, although it had its ceremonious rituals.

The magical ceremonies described in the novel are directed by Simon Leclerc in an increasingly desperate effort to subordinate Betty to his will, now that the complication of her love for Jonathan Drayton challenges his influence. The effort to make a final division between Betty's material and spirit bodies fails when Lester substitutes herself. It is a double failure, however, leading to the curtailment of Simon's power. Simon had persisted with his ceremony even when it was plainly not going to work, thus breaking a fundamental rule in magic. His will to dominate increasingly interferes with his clarity of purpose thereafter. The second ceremony involves the creation of the homunculus as a way of removing Lester. Though successful in itself, Simon's contempt for those he manipulates makes him underestimate the power of love. Lester now has a spiritual bond with Betty and also wishes to make amends to her husband; the acquisition of a body, however deformed, is the means by which she can thwart Simon's murderous intention yet again, which his lack of empathy is unable to foresee.

Love and hate are pitted against each other in other ways too. As a child Betty had been secretly christened by her nurse, who had made the Holy Spirit her sponsoring godparent. This is the third ceremony in the novel, described when Betty visits her old nurse with Jonathan. The fourth ceremony is Simon's consequentially foredoomed attempt to destroy Betty by means of a clay figure to which hairs from her brush have been added. In terms of the mechanics of the novel, the mistake made here is allowing ill-will to intrude into what should be a selfless ceremony. It is at this point, as Simon stabs at the image, and then at Betty herself, that the last of his power disappears and the cries of his followers are heard as they discover the cures he performed on them have now been reversed. ... (wikipedia.org)

Williams gives a contemporary setting to the traditional story of the Search for the Holy Grail. Examining the distinction between magic and religion, War in Heaven is an eerily disturbing book, one that graphically portrays a metaphysical journey through the shadowy crevices of the human mind.

When Taliessin through Logres was published in 1938, it received widespread critical acclaim. Alongside its partner companion The Region of the Summer Stars, it stands as one of the most profound and challenging works in Williams' body of work--and one of the most important to understanding him fully. In this new edition, both Taliessin through Logres and The Region of the Summer Stars are found together, with a new introduction by Williams scholar S rina Higgins.

Taliessin through Logres is designed to reward multiple readings. The poetry is technically virtuosic, musically beautiful, and conceptually complex. It is densely packed with layers of symbolism and rich imagery that are not initially easy to understand, but that scintillate with ever greater brilliance upon repeated readings.
--from the Introduction by S rina Higgins

Some of the most fascinating poetry written in our time. Taliessin through Logres and The Region of the Summer Stars contain (Williams') Grail poems, a reworking of the theme of the Holy Grail into a poetic myth of unusual wisdom and contemporary significance. It is a unique handling, a fresh vision, of an old subject-matter which has been almost completely neglected in English literature.
--C.P. Crowley

The more I read Taliessin through Logres and The Region of the Summer Stars, the more rewarding I find them.... Charles Williams has his own mythology which a reader must master.
--W.H. Auden

Romantic theology is the working out of ways in which an ordinary relationship between two people can become one that is extraordinary, one that grants us glimpses, visions of perfection. In experiencing romantic love, we experience God: He has been in the experience from the beginning, and the more we learn about it, the more we learn also about Him. -adapted from the Introduction and the Sequel Charles Williams was one of the finest-not to mention one of the most unusual-theologians of the twentieth century. His mysticism is palpable-the unseen world interpenetrates ours at every point, and spiritual exchange occurs all the time, unseen and largely unlooked for. His novels are legend, and as a member of the Inklings, he contributed to the mythopoetic revival in contemporary culture.

'The Figure of Beatrice' is an analytical discussion of the character by the same name who features heavily in the writings of Dante. Originally published in 1943, Williams' essay is a thought-provoking interpretation of Dante and both the human and divine aspects associated with love. Charles Williams (1886-1945) was a British theologian, playwright, novelist and poet. As a member of the 'Inklings' literary group at Oxford, his work supported a strong sense of narrative. Williams acknowledged the spiritual undercurrents present in life and his literary explorations into Christian fantasy writing, such as 'Descent into Hell' (1937), earned him many followers. This classic work is now being republished in a new modern edition with a specially commissioned introductory biography.

Dante's extraordinary intensity of thought and experience may well be unequaled among poets, but this very power can all too often make his work seem formidable to many readers. Charles Williams's Figure of Beatrice stands out amid the vast field of Dante scholarship for its uniquely sympathetic enthusiasm and clarity, which brilliantly unlock this master poet's vast reach for general readers and specialists alike. Williams begins by tracing the way in which the central image of Beatrice, representing transcendent beauty in feminine form, animates Dante's earlier works. He then plunges into and expounds on The Divine Comedy, meditating on its significance primarily through the affirmation of theological images. Foreshadowing the modern emphasis on Dante as philosopher-poet, Williams also touches on many later concerns of Dante criticism, including ambiguities of language, the inherent self-contradiction of all truly penetrating discourse, and in particular the archetypal role of the feminine. First published in 1943, The Figure of Beatrice, which is as much a moving and poetic work in its own right as it is a stirring testament to the Sommo Poeta, remains a must read for all lovers of Dante.

'The House by the Stable - A Christmas Play' is an example of Williams' religious dramatic verse exploring themes of Christian symbolism. Charles Williams (1886-1945) was a British theologian, playwright, novelist and poet. As a member of the 'Inklings' literary group at Oxford, his work supported a strong sense of narrative. Williams acknowledged the spiritual undercurrents present in life and his literary explorations into Christian fantasy writing, such as 'Descent into Hell' (1937), earned him many followers. This classic work is now being republished in a new modern edition with a specially commissioned introductory biography.

The Place of the Lion is a fantasy novel written by Charles Williams. The novel was first published in 1931.

Platonic archetypes begin to appear throughout England, wreaking havoc and drawing to the surface the spiritual strengths and flaws of individual characters. (wikipedia.org)

First published in 1931, The Place of the Lion is a fantasy novel by British writer Charles W. S. Williams. A small English town is plunged into chaos when platonic archetypes start to appear near it, bringing out the spiritual strengths and flaws of all those who live there. The focus of their manifestations seems to be the house of Mr Berringer, the leader of the group who falls into a deep coma after coming into contact with a mysterious lion. Charles Walter Stansby Williams (1886 - 1945) was a British theologian, novelist, poet, playwright, and literary critic. He was also a member of the The Inklings, a literary discussion group connected to the University of Oxford, England. They were exclusively literary enthusiasts who championed the merit of narrative in fiction and concentrated on writing fantasy. He was given an scholarship to University College London, but was forced to leave in 1904 because he couldn't afford the tuition fees. Other notable works by this author include: The Greater Trumps (1932), War in Heaven (1930), and The Place of the Lion (1931). This volume is highly recommended for lovers of fantasy fiction, and it would make for a fantastic addition to any collection. Many vintage books such as this are increasingly scarce and expensive. It is with this in mind that we are republishing this volume now in an affordable, modern, high-quality edition complete with the original text and artwork.

Charles Williams had a genius for choosing strange and exciting themes for his novels and making them believable and profoundly suggestive of spiritual truths. All Hallows' Eve is the story of a man and woman whose love was so great it could bridge the gap of death; of evil so terrible as to be unmentionable, of a vision so beautiful it must be true.