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December 14, 1997

 Owen Barfield died on December 14, 1997. Photographs of this obscure philosopher show a sweet man. During the century he lived, his friendships are the first thing readers would recall--he was one of the inner circle of Tolkien's Oxford buddies--a circle that included C. S. Lewis, and Charles Williams. Apparently he was influential on Lewis, as this anecdote suggests: hearing Lewis refer to philosophizing as a profession, Barfield corrected Lewis, saying "Philosophy is a 'way.'" Barfield was not a fiction writer but he did write a novel: English People, and fortunately for cat almanacists, there is a cat in the novel. A cat along with fictive Rudolph Steiner, Freud, and Jung. The cat, named Merlin, gets lost, and drama surrounds the question of whether the cat has been stolen by magicians. 

Just in case you wondered what people were thinking about between the 20th century wars.

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