Kat Forbes: Space Trilogy #2

Man is from Thulcandra, women are from Perelandra 
Entry #7
Katherine Forbes

At the bottom of page 75 continuing onto page 76 when Weston has just accused Ransom of seducing a native, and Ransom awkwardly explains, or attempts to explain, that the situation was not as it would appear.  His stumbling effort to explain to Weston that he and the Lady were not being intimate, despite giving every appearance (such as running about an island entirely naked; having the Lady crash into him giving the appearance of an erotic embrace) that such was the case, was a paragraph at which most readers might chuckle and give no further thought.  This passage jumped out to me however, because Ransom’s position is so reminiscent of Lewis’ own strange living arrangement with a woman.  Perhaps buried in the tale of Perelandra is embedded the answer to the mystery Lewis would not share with his friends or even his brother: the mystery of his relationship with the widow Mrs. Moore.  Old enough to be his mother it was a strange thing that Lewis and Mrs. Moore became such attentive friends and eventually house-mates.  All Humphrey Carpenter could provide on the matter was that the relationship sprang from a mutual need for companionship and then turned into something entirely unexplainable, hinting at an affair but lacking several key characteristics of one; which could easily be paralleled with Ransom’s relationship with the Green Lady.  Lewis has shared several personal opinions, beliefs, and preferences through the character of Ransom (despite the presence of himself as narrator), is it entirely unlikely that he would throw in a brief explanation, even justification, for his life with Mrs. Moore?  Precedent might incline one to think so, but the event could also have no parallel whatsoever, I suppose the matter will remain in our imaginations. 

Further evidence for this point rests in the great number of references to his fellow Inklings throughout The Space Trilogy.  For example he mentions Barfield in That Hideous Strength, and he gives an actual role to Humphrey.  My first question when Humphrey was introduced was whether this could be a reference to a very real Humphrey, the author of the The Inklings Humphrey Carpenter.  However I was mistaken.  Humphrey is actually the nickname for one of the Inklings, a real doctor, named Robert Emlyn Harvard, and he was the beloved physician for both Jack and Warnie Lewis, and the Tolkien family.