Arthur Greeves

Joseph Arthur Greeves (27 August 1895 – 29 August 1966) was a British artist from Belfast, best known as the lifelong best friend and principal correspondent of C. S. Lewis. Lewis described Greeves as “after my brother, my oldest and most intimate friend.” Their friendship began in 1914 and continued until Lewis’s death in 1963, producing one of the most important bodies of private correspondence in Lewis studies.

Greeves is also notable because he was a homosexual male, a fact identified and discussed by several Lewis biographers and scholars. Greeves came out as gay to Lewis in a May 1918 letter, after which Lewis responded with complete acceptance.

Early life and family

Greeves was born in Belfast into a wealthy family connected with the linen industry. His family owned J. & T. M. Greeves & Co., a flax-spinning company, and lived directly across the street from the Lewis family in east Belfast. He was raised in a household connected with the Plymouth Brethren tradition.

Education and artistic career

Greeves attended Campbell College in Belfast from 1906 to 1912.

Friendship with C. S. Lewis

Greeves’s historical importance rests chiefly on his relationship with C. S. Lewis. Their friendship began in 1914, when Lewis was a teenager, and lasted nearly fifty years until Lewis' death. Scholars have repeatedly treated the Lewis–Greeves correspondence as essential evidence for Lewis’s personal development.

In the early letters, Lewis discussed books, myths, school life, religion, loneliness, and aesthetic experience. Lookadoo has argued that these letters anticipate features later associated with the Inklings, including literary companionship, criticism, imaginative exchange, and shared reading.

Joseph A. Kohm Jr. argues that Greeves may properly be considered Lewis’s best friend because of the unusually long duration and emotional vulnerability of the friendship. Lepojärvi’s review of Kohm’s book describes They Stand Together as the central primary source for the subject.

Sexuality

Greeves has been described by several Lewis biographers and commentators as homosexual. Christopher’s article “What Was Arthur Greeves’ Sexual Orientation?” specifically examined the evidence and argued that Greeves’s sexuality is an important feature of the Lewis–Greeves relationship. Urban notes that Greeves is generally considered one of Lewis’s closest friends and discusses him in the context of Lewis’s complex relationship to gay literary scholarship and homosexuality. Later scholarship has continued to emphasize that Greeves should not be treated merely as a peripheral friend, but as one of the major relationships of Lewis’s life.