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A Naked Tree: Love Sonnets to C. S. Lewis and Other Poems
Displays for the first time the complete work of a neglected poetic genius Although best known as C. S. Lewis's wife, Joy Davidman was a gifted writer herself who produced, among other things, two novels and an award-winning volume of poetry in her short lifetime. The first comprehensive collection of Davidman's poetry, A Naked Tree includes the poems that originally appeared in her Letter to a Comrade (1938), forty other published poems, and more than two hundred previously unpublished poems that came to light in a remarkable 2010 discovery. Of special interest is Davidman's sequence of forty-five love sonnets to C. S. Lewis, which offer stunning evidence of her spiritual struggles with regard to her feelings for Lewis, her sense of God's working in her lonely life, and her mounting frustration with Lewis for keeping her at arm's length emotionally and physically. Readers of these Davidman poems -- arranged chronologically by Don King -- will discover three recurring, overarching God, death, and immortality; politics, including capitalism and communism; and (the most by far) romantic, erotic love. This volume marks Joy Davidman as a figure to be reckoned with in the landscape of twentieth-century American poetry.
- GenresPoetry
338 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 29, 2015
42 people are currently reading
690 people want to read
About the author
Joy Davidman
18 books66 followersJoy Davidman (born Helen Joy Davidman; 18 April 1915 – 13 July 1960) was an American poet and writer. Often referred to as a child prodigy, she earned a master's degree from Columbia University in English literature in 1935. For her book of poems, Letter to a Comrade, she won the Yale Series of Younger Poets Competition in 1938 and the Russell Loines Award for Poetry in 1939. She was the author of several books, including two novels.
While an atheist and after becoming a member of the American Communist Party, she met and married her first husband and father of her two sons, William Lindsay Gresham, in 1942. After a troubled marriage, and following her conversion to Christianity, they divorced and she left America to travel to England with her sons.
Davidman published her best known work, Smoke on the Mountain: An Interpretation of the Ten Commandments in 1954 with a preface by C.S. Lewis. Lewis had been an influence on her work and conversion and became her second husband after her permanent relocation to England in 1956. She died from secondary bone cancer in 1960.
The relationship that developed between Davidman and Lewis has been featured in a television BBC film, a stage play and a cinema film named Shadowlands. Lewis published A Grief Observed under a pseudonym in 1961, from notebooks he kept after his wife's death revealing his immense grief and a period of questioning God.
While an atheist and after becoming a member of the American Communist Party, she met and married her first husband and father of her two sons, William Lindsay Gresham, in 1942. After a troubled marriage, and following her conversion to Christianity, they divorced and she left America to travel to England with her sons.
Davidman published her best known work, Smoke on the Mountain: An Interpretation of the Ten Commandments in 1954 with a preface by C.S. Lewis. Lewis had been an influence on her work and conversion and became her second husband after her permanent relocation to England in 1956. She died from secondary bone cancer in 1960.
The relationship that developed between Davidman and Lewis has been featured in a television BBC film, a stage play and a cinema film named Shadowlands. Lewis published A Grief Observed under a pseudonym in 1961, from notebooks he kept after his wife's death revealing his immense grief and a period of questioning God.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
May 9, 2016
A Naked Tree is subtitled "Love Sonnets to C.S. Lewis and Other Poems." However, this subtitle is misleading and used for name recognition to help the book sell more copies. The book is in fact 300 pages long with only 40 of those pages devoted to the Love Sonnets. The book is organized chronologically and starts with poetry as early as 1929, when Joy Davidman would have been only 14 years of age. I remember poetry I wrote at that age, and it was nowhere near as composed as her poetry. Here is a sample:
What spur of gold is this that pricks the dawn
To further flaming of its fierce desire
Of glory? On the eager winds of morn
Comes bowing down the soul-devouring fire
That keenly lashes the mad spirit higher
And higher yet; the dry hot fever of fame,
The far bright crown to which all slaves aspire-
Need most imperative, to which the name
Of fondest love shows but a flickering flame.
After her early poetry, the complete "Letter to a Comrade" is included in this anthology, and this section is followed by "Poems 1939-1940" and "Poems 1941-1952." Looking at just the length of these sections, it seems that Davidman did a bulk of her poetry writing from 1938 ("Letter to a Comrade" poetry) to 1940, as these two sections/three years comprised 125 of the 300 pages. When you finally do arrive at the love sonnets, it feels like arriving home after a long journey. Her poetry up until that point felt like she wasn't sure who she was and that she was searching. The sonnets to C.S. Lewis, it is like she has finally found what she is looking for, not just C.S. Lewis, but God as well.
Reading through this book, I can safely say two things. First, Joy Davidman was a much better poet than her husband C.S. Lewis. Second, Davidman was much less appreciated and acknowledged that C.S. Lewis. If you want to understand not just Joy Davidman, but also C.S. Lewis, then this is a book that you should take the time to read. Once again, Don W. King demonstrates his impeccable research and brings us an important book on Lewis and Davidman. If you have an interest in either/both of these authors, pick up a copy of this book for your personal library.
What spur of gold is this that pricks the dawn
To further flaming of its fierce desire
Of glory? On the eager winds of morn
Comes bowing down the soul-devouring fire
That keenly lashes the mad spirit higher
And higher yet; the dry hot fever of fame,
The far bright crown to which all slaves aspire-
Need most imperative, to which the name
Of fondest love shows but a flickering flame.
After her early poetry, the complete "Letter to a Comrade" is included in this anthology, and this section is followed by "Poems 1939-1940" and "Poems 1941-1952." Looking at just the length of these sections, it seems that Davidman did a bulk of her poetry writing from 1938 ("Letter to a Comrade" poetry) to 1940, as these two sections/three years comprised 125 of the 300 pages. When you finally do arrive at the love sonnets, it feels like arriving home after a long journey. Her poetry up until that point felt like she wasn't sure who she was and that she was searching. The sonnets to C.S. Lewis, it is like she has finally found what she is looking for, not just C.S. Lewis, but God as well.
Reading through this book, I can safely say two things. First, Joy Davidman was a much better poet than her husband C.S. Lewis. Second, Davidman was much less appreciated and acknowledged that C.S. Lewis. If you want to understand not just Joy Davidman, but also C.S. Lewis, then this is a book that you should take the time to read. Once again, Don W. King demonstrates his impeccable research and brings us an important book on Lewis and Davidman. If you have an interest in either/both of these authors, pick up a copy of this book for your personal library.
October 23, 2019
As you might guess from the title, the selling point of this book is the series of love poems that Joy Davidman compiled for C.S. Lewis in the mid-1950s.
(It's worth noting that those poems take up a relatively modest portion of the book -- this is more of a "collected poetry of Joy Davidman" than a book of poetry about C.S. Lewis)
The evidence seems to suggest that she took a series of poems she had written over the course of years--some of them long before she met Lewis--and arranged them in a specific sequence in an effort to persuade Lewis to overcome his inhibitions and return her affections.
Some of the poems are . . . quite colorful! Make of that what you will.
Where Lewis chronicled (see what I did there?) his own spiritual journey through his late memoir, Surprised by Joy, this collection chronicles Joy's spiritual and intellectual journey through her poetry. The subjects covered in these poems are wide-ranging but tend towards politics, religion, love . . . basically, all those things that tend to provoke a strong reaction in most of us.
It's hard to pick a favorite. Almost every poem in this volume could fuel an essay. But setting aside the poems aimed at C.S.L., I think one of those that sticks with me the most is the one titled "Fairytale," dated 1943. In this one, the narrator describes a recurring dream in which she is always looking for a "Castle Safety" that represents the end of all earthly woes and the fulfillment of all earthly hope and happiness . . . but the poem concludes with the lines "we always woke / we never got there." It's a piercing end to a beautiful vision, and I can't help being reminded of C.S. Lewis's oft-cited description of his own unsatisfied longings (which he later identified with his longing for God) as a young man.
I could go on . . . about the poem where a black man fights in WWII only to return home to the same old demeaning handyman job he had before the war. Or the poem that hypes up the beautiful side of New York City that tourists are attracted to, only to end with an ironic vision of the city's ugly side: homelessness, misery, crime.
This is an impressive collection that any fan of Lewis, any fan of poetry, or any reader interested in the whole scope of the human experience would do well to spend some time with.
(It's worth noting that those poems take up a relatively modest portion of the book -- this is more of a "collected poetry of Joy Davidman" than a book of poetry about C.S. Lewis)
The evidence seems to suggest that she took a series of poems she had written over the course of years--some of them long before she met Lewis--and arranged them in a specific sequence in an effort to persuade Lewis to overcome his inhibitions and return her affections.
Some of the poems are . . . quite colorful! Make of that what you will.
Where Lewis chronicled (see what I did there?) his own spiritual journey through his late memoir, Surprised by Joy, this collection chronicles Joy's spiritual and intellectual journey through her poetry. The subjects covered in these poems are wide-ranging but tend towards politics, religion, love . . . basically, all those things that tend to provoke a strong reaction in most of us.
It's hard to pick a favorite. Almost every poem in this volume could fuel an essay. But setting aside the poems aimed at C.S.L., I think one of those that sticks with me the most is the one titled "Fairytale," dated 1943. In this one, the narrator describes a recurring dream in which she is always looking for a "Castle Safety" that represents the end of all earthly woes and the fulfillment of all earthly hope and happiness . . . but the poem concludes with the lines "we always woke / we never got there." It's a piercing end to a beautiful vision, and I can't help being reminded of C.S. Lewis's oft-cited description of his own unsatisfied longings (which he later identified with his longing for God) as a young man.
I could go on . . . about the poem where a black man fights in WWII only to return home to the same old demeaning handyman job he had before the war. Or the poem that hypes up the beautiful side of New York City that tourists are attracted to, only to end with an ironic vision of the city's ugly side: homelessness, misery, crime.
This is an impressive collection that any fan of Lewis, any fan of poetry, or any reader interested in the whole scope of the human experience would do well to spend some time with.
July 31, 2021
✦ 3/5 ✦
Disclaimer: I didn't fully read this collection, I skimmed.
Joy Davidman is a horribly underappreciated poet and writer and I have great respect for her and her work, but I was underwhelmed by this book, especially by the way her few sexually explicit poems were (in my opinion) overly emphasized.
Disclaimer: I didn't fully read this collection, I skimmed.
Joy Davidman is a horribly underappreciated poet and writer and I have great respect for her and her work, but I was underwhelmed by this book, especially by the way her few sexually explicit poems were (in my opinion) overly emphasized.
January 18, 2018
I don't know if this counts as "read" because I did skim (this is a large selection spanning the author's entire life and there is plenty of dross) but several pieces stood out as really good. "Noyade" is a dark, erotic poem that uses the historical atrocities in Revolutionary-era Nantes as a metaphor (however uncomfortable I may be with that choice, it works fantastically well here). "Benedick the Married Man" is short and creepy, deliciously unsettling. "Those Foully Murdered" is Communist agitprop but also a deep meditation on the nature of martyrdom and death. "In Memory of Hermann Bottcher" is a WWII poem that contrasts those who "borrow trouble" with those who turn away indifferent from the dark truth in front of them. "Prayer Before Daybreak" is beautiful in its exploration of faith and immediacy; you can read it online here.
March 11, 2024
Reading this while listening to 'A Grief Observed' is emotional whiplash. The parallels between Lewis being mad at God for putting Joy in his life only to take her away and Joy being mad at God for putting the ultimate love of her life (Lewis) in her life only to have him say he doesn't love her back, is heartbreaking.
It is obvious just how much Joy Davidman and C.S. Lewis loved each other.
In 'A Grief Observed' (1961) C.S. Lewis calls Joy a sword and Joy had written a poem titled A Sword Named Joy (Feb 23, 1953).
Joy's Sonnet XXIII (1954? 1955?) was also called 'The Problem of Pain' after - one can only assume - Lewis' book of the same name published in 1940.
Also Sonnet XXXV (May 9 1954 - 3 years before Joy's cancer diagnosis) which is about a child who uses magic to bring back a dead woman and ends with the line "Child, it is dangerous to raise the dead." mirrors Lewis statement in 'A Grief Observed': "Even the insane call: come back, is all for my own sake. I never even raised the question if such a return - if it were possible - would be good for her. I want her back as an ingredient in the restoration of my past - could I have wished her anything worse? Having got once through death to come back and then - at some later date - have all her dying to do over again? They call Steven the first martyr - hadn't Lazarus the rawer deal?"
This isn't even mentioning Joy's poem titled: Apologetic Ballad by a White Witch or the impressive Bread-and-Butter Sestina that she wrote at C.S. Lewis' request.
It is obvious just how much Joy Davidman and C.S. Lewis loved each other.
In 'A Grief Observed' (1961) C.S. Lewis calls Joy a sword and Joy had written a poem titled A Sword Named Joy (Feb 23, 1953).
Joy's Sonnet XXIII (1954? 1955?) was also called 'The Problem of Pain' after - one can only assume - Lewis' book of the same name published in 1940.
Also Sonnet XXXV (May 9 1954 - 3 years before Joy's cancer diagnosis) which is about a child who uses magic to bring back a dead woman and ends with the line "Child, it is dangerous to raise the dead." mirrors Lewis statement in 'A Grief Observed': "Even the insane call: come back, is all for my own sake. I never even raised the question if such a return - if it were possible - would be good for her. I want her back as an ingredient in the restoration of my past - could I have wished her anything worse? Having got once through death to come back and then - at some later date - have all her dying to do over again? They call Steven the first martyr - hadn't Lazarus the rawer deal?"
This isn't even mentioning Joy's poem titled: Apologetic Ballad by a White Witch or the impressive Bread-and-Butter Sestina that she wrote at C.S. Lewis' request.
May 18, 2023
This is the first book of poetry I’ve read. After reading “Becoming Mrs. Lewis” I’ve wanted to read this, (lots of the lines from these poems are quoted at the beginning of each chapter of that book).
I really enjoy her poetry, especially the poems that come after “The Haunted Atheist”. The love sonnets to Lewis are very raw and authentic, and expertly crafted. I went through them very quickly. Not because I wasn’t into them but because they were so good I wanted to keep reading.
I really enjoy her poetry, especially the poems that come after “The Haunted Atheist”. The love sonnets to Lewis are very raw and authentic, and expertly crafted. I went through them very quickly. Not because I wasn’t into them but because they were so good I wanted to keep reading.
December 15, 2021
Reading Joy Davidman's work made me want to go back and read A Grief Observed. What a love. It's official Jack and Joy are my favorite authors and people. Two giants who found each other. Providence at It's best. Even in their death. I'll definitely be coming back to this book while simultaneously also visiting A Grief Observed. I've found my people ❤❤
March 18, 2022
I'm not much on poetry- this is really my first attempt. That's likely why I struggled with this book -- I just didn't "get" it
January 25, 2025
I've really enjoyed reading this at the same time as biographical books on Joy Davidman and C S Lewis.
December 23, 2021
Intriguing to consider from the perspective of Davidman. I typically am not a romantic poetry person, but I enjoyed this quick read. I should call it more of a skim, though, I must say.
December 16, 2016
Davidman catches you off-guard with her stark descriptions and metaphors; this is a book of poetry that is raw, real, and fiercely determined to get to the heart of mankind.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews