(1886-1945) UK writer, poet and lay theologian whose novels are essentially theological Fantasy thrillers; he was closely associated with C S Lewis and J R R Tolkien as part of the Oxford reading group known as the Inklings. His romantic and obscurely devout use of Tarot and Grail imagery helped bring these themes into the generic mainstream. Of his novels, the first-written though not first-published is Shadows of Ecstasy (1933), featuring a false Messiah and an uprising of black African peoples against European civilization; there is upheaval in London. Many Dimensions (1931) bears the closest though still remote resemblance to sf, in that it depicts our world as being threatened by the dangerous powers of a magical stone that can be split into endless identical copies without diminishing the original. These powers include Teleportation (with consequent disruption of Transportation economics), healing and some curious variations of Time Travel. Nevertheless, as in the remainder of Williams's fiction, the bent of the fantasy is towards Religion, with human exploitation of the numinous stone's properties being regarded not as exhilaratingly, science-fictionally transformative but as blasphemous. The Timeslip contact between different centuries in Descent into Hell (1937) is similarly devoted to idiosyncratic theological ends. Fantastic devices in All Hallows' Eve (1945) include sympathetic ghosts (> Supernatural Creatures) and a kind of Golem. Williams also wrote a long series of connected poems on the subject of King Arthur, beginning with Taliessin Through Logres (coll of linked poems 1938 chap). Though never achieving the sales of his friends Lewis and Tolkien, Williams had and still has many devoted followers. [DRL/JC]
see also: The Encyclopedia of Fantasy; Mythology.
Charles Walter Stansby Williams
born London: 20 September 1886
died Oxford, Oxfordshire: 15 May 1945
works (selected)
novels
poetry
series
Arthur
nonfiction
- Witchcraft
(London: Faber and Faber, 1941) [nonfiction: working title was «The History of Witchcraft» (seen on proof copies): hb/]
about the author
links
Previous versions of this entry