Happy endings are used by many people to say that fairy tales are a load of baloney, my theory on this is that in today's culture, especially here in America people confuse happiness with perfection. That joy can only be obtained through getting to goals, or not having any problems, or being the smartest one of your friend group, or something like that. While these are not bad in and of themselves, saying that something like that is the only way to be happy is by those things is where we get into trouble. You see in fairy tales the ending goes: "they lived happily ever after, not: "they lived trouble free ever after", or even: "they live together ever after," it goes: "they lived happily ever after." Let me explain with one of my favorite authors of all time: C.S. Lewis.
Like Walt Disney, Clive Staples Lewis lived a sucky life: when he was about three or four his dog, Jacksie, died starting Lewis's life filled with death. On his father, Albert's, birthday in 1908, Lewis's mother, Flora Lewis died of cancer. This same year Lewis's grandfather and great-uncle died and Lewis was sent to a boarding school for two years. After that he was transferred to a different boarding school that he had to quit because of respiratory problems. He was than enrolled in a school near a health resort, it was at this school that Lewis gave up on Christianity. Lewis enlisted in the British army where his college roommate was killed in battle and Lewis was wounded and a year later and discharged. He continued his studies at Oxford University, where he published poems in school magazines and officially published "Death in Battle." Eventually he started teaching at Oxford for many years. Finally in 1929 Lewis's father died and Lewis became a theist and two years later. After a long talk with his friends J.R.R. Tolkien, and Hugo Dyson, Lewis became a Christian again. From that point on C.S. Lewis never had it easy,
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. was mocked by his friends, his married life was so stressful he wrote a book about it, and he eventually died on November 22 1963 with his grave reading a favorite Shakespeare quote of his: "men must endure their going hence."
C. S. Lewis was a great man, and I have no doubt he died happily. Why? His life was filled with death, doubt, and diseases, these are all things that people use to justify giving up. He never gave up because he never gave in. He never gave in to the idea that to be an adult you have to be a grown up. Never gave in to blaming God for all his problems. And he never gave into the idea that happiness came through anything this world could give him. And that is the happy ending: not one of wealth, sex, power, or fun, but of contentment.
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