It was at Lewis’ suggestion that I applied for a position at Assumption College. He suggested that if I were to come to Windsor with him, we could start up again his magazine, The Enemy, which had been published twice in 1927 and once in 1929. Although an appeal had been made in the first number for “some sort of conscious-cooperation” and contributions were made by T.S. Eliot, Henry John, and Roy Campbell, this “review of art and literature” was largely the work of Lewis himself.
“The nearest big revolutionary settlement lies some distance behind me,” he wrote in the first issue. “I have moved outside. I found it impossible to come to terms with the canons observed in it. Outside I am freer.” I was accepted into the English Department at Assumption, but this was toward the very end of the war, so that Lewis sailed back to England before we had any opportunity to proceed with the magazine project. However, it was the job in Windsor that led to my transfer to the Basilian College of St. Michael’s in Toronto, where I have continued to teach. So it was a decisive event in my life.