We went to CS Lewis Square, a 24-hour access park where there are 7 statues from The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. The last statue is of Professor Digory as a young man, opening the door to a wardrobe. I suppose everyone thinks it is a statue of Lewis himself. I certainly did at first. The official name is The Searcher Centenary Statue. Carved into the pavement surrounding the statue is a box with words along the edges. "C.S. 'Jack' Lewis - Ulsterman" is the first side. He would have flipped to see that as his main descriptor, I thought. The name of the statue is along the second side. The third side gives his Date of Birth and Date of Conversion...that's interesting. The fourth side is Writer. Scholar. Teacher. Christian. Accurate at least, and I suppose it's in chronological order.
But...Ulsterman? As the lead descriptor? Yet I reconsidered. The statue is right in front of a public library branch which has a display of Lewis's children's books. I don't know how widely-read Lewis is in Northern Ireland now, and many children may not have ever heard of him. So the inscription is letting them know, right off the bat, "he was from around here. He's one of us." It's a possible hook to get a kid interested, as are the statues themselves.
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