Lewis refers to a house of cards throughout A Grief Observed to represent the temporary and fragile nature of human endeavor, especially Lewis’s own endeavors, compared with the permanence and endurance of God. Transitory and provisional in nature, the house of cards is usually portrayed as collapsing or being knocked over. Lewis uses the house of cars to describe his crisis of faith: “if my house has collapsed at one blow, that is because it was a house of cards” (37).Had his faith been more “real,” rather than “imagination,” it wouldn’t have collapsed when confronted with grief.

That he continues to describe his faith in such terms indicates it is still weak: “Indeed it’s likely enough that what I shall call, if it happens, a ‘restoration of faith’ will turn out to be only one more house of cards” (39). Sometimes, it is necessary for the house of cards to be knocked over because it is the only way to capture his attention and force a realization of the truth: “and I must surely admit–H. would have forced me to admit in a few passes—that, if my house was a house of cards, the sooner it was knocked down the better” (38). 

The house of cards also represents human folly and Lewis’s failure to learn from experience: “However, often the house of cards falls, shall I set about rebuilding it? Is that what I’m doing now?” (38). Sometimes God collapses the house of cards to communicate with Lewis: “He always knew that my temple was a house of cards. His only way of making me realize the fact was to knock it down” (52). On a grander scale, “cardcastle” is used to depict his love for both Helen and God.