Tag: The Riddle of the Sphinx

Owen Barfield’s Reception of The Abolition of Man by C. S. Lewis

Owen Barfield, whom C. S. Lewis described archetypally as his “Second Friend” – “the man who disagrees with you about everything […] not so much the alter ego as the antiself” – on a number of occasions expressed his agreement with the argument of The Abolition of Man, and his admiration of the book. For example, describing various means by which one can become aware of the presuppositions of one’s thoughts, Barfield once wrote:

One, of which the best example I know is C.


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A Word About The Riddle of the Sphinx

A new collection of essays by Owen Barfield, The Riddle of the Sphinx,  was published by the Barfield Press in November 2023. The book’s name comes from one of the essay titles.

But “the riddle” in this case does not refer to the famous one that Oedipus solved — “What has four legs at dawn, two at noon, and three in the evening?” The answer to that one was, “man”. Or today we might say, “the human being”. Oedipus realized that he crawls as a toddler, stands upright as an adult, and may be supported by a stick in old age.


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