What was the title of C.S. Lewis’s 1956 allegorical novel based partly on the Cupid and Psyche myth?

Till We Have Faces is C.S. Lewis’s 1956 novel based partly on the Cupid and Psyche myth.

The novel retells the ancient story from the viewpoint of Orual, a princess and later queen of the fictional kingdom of Glome. Her account centers on her relationship with her half-sister Psyche, whom Orual loves deeply but also resents and tries to protect.

Lewis drew on the myth as it appears in Apuleius’s The Golden Ass, but he substantially reshaped the setting, characters, and psychological conflict. The result is a dark, mature work about love, jealousy, religious belief, self-knowledge, and the ways people construct accusations against the gods.

Till We Have Faces was Lewis’s last completed novel. It is sometimes overlooked beside The Chronicles of Narnia, but Lewis regarded it as one of his most satisfying works of fiction. The title comes from the novel’s concern with becoming fully honest and seeing oneself clearly.