Posted on by Stephanie McGann

Narnia #6: Prince Caspian

Prince Caspian was an exciting story to read with my five- and six-year-old sons. It brought back the Pevensie children, featured Aslan prominently, and introduced lots of wonderful new characters. We read this one over only a few bedtimes and talked about all sorts of motifs like Time, Change, and Mortality. It was great fun, but it also got a little heavy at times—even more so than The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. I’ll explain why after I summarize the story.

THE STORY

Prince Caspian begins with Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie standing on a platform waiting for a train that will take them back to school for the Fall semester. Suddenly, a strange magic takes hold of them and whisks them back into Narnia. Only they don’t know it’s Narnia at first.

The land is so changed with time, they don’t recognize it. Even their fair castle of Cair Paravel has fallen to ruins. All that is left of it are a few crumbling walls and a treasure room that somehow remained intact. When they discover Peter’s sword and Lucy’s vial of healing potion, among other items from their once glorious reign, they realize they are back in Narnia but that some hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years have passed.

They set out to solve the great mystery of Narnia’s transformation and happen upon soldiers in the act of drowning a dwarf. Susan shoots at the soldiers with her bow, causing them to flee, and the children rescue the dwarf. His name is Trumpkin. The children introduce themselves as the High King Peter, Queen Susan, King Edmund, and Queen Lucy, but Trumpkin does not believe them, not least because the Golden Age of their reign is so long past. Nevertheless, Trumpkin explains that Narnia has never been the same since their royal family left because it was soon invaded by the Telmarines. They have controlled Narnia all these years, making life bitter for the “Old Narnians” like himself and sending them into hiding.

Now, however, they have risen up under the leadership of Caspian, an orphaned Telmarine prince whose right to the throne was subverted by his evil uncle, the false King Miraz. Happily, Caspian wants to bring back the Golden Age of Narnia complete with the liberties it entailed. A decisive battle is now underway. In a final act of desperation, they had blown Susan’s magic horn: legend held that it would bring help.

The Pevensie children are, of course, that help, but Trumpkin finds that too incredible to be true. They’re just children, after all, and they should be dead all these years later! Susan attempts to prove her royal credentials by challenging Trumpkin to an archery shootout. Dwarfs are well-known for being excellent archers, so Trumpkin is caught much off guard (and feels quite embarrassed) when Susan beats him. Though he accepts their help and begins to believe they really are the royal family of old, he refuses to believe in Aslan. At best, the Lion was a hero from the past, but it is just as likely that He only ever existed in the imagination of the people.    

They set off for Prince Caspian’s camp, which is located at the Stone Table now called Aslan’s How. Edmund and Peter steer them along a course they believe to be a short-cut, but the terrain is so changed that they find themselves twisting and turning in unexpected ways. Luckily, Lucy spots Aslan and realizes He wants to lead them along a different route. The others look but see nothing and dismiss Lucy’s sighting as a wishful vision. With Peter and Edmund still in command, the party continues along its original course and eventually has to double-back because they run right into Telmarine forces.   

Soon after Lucy again sees Aslan. Though she is still the only one, Edmund takes her side and convinces the others to go along with her. The way seems impossible, but it actually offers them just the entry point they need to reach Prince Caspian’s camp. Edmund eventually sees Aslan with his own eyes, followed by Peter, and Susan last of all. Susan later admits that she hadn’t really wanted to see Aslan at first, and we know that something has changed in her. Nevertheless, Aslan speaks kindly to her and all the children. Trumpkin alone is still unable to see Aslan, but he follows Peter’s orders because he now fully believes in him as the High King.

Next, the girls set off with Aslan to gather reinforcements. Meanwhile, the boys follow Trumpkin into camp headquarters to present themselves to Prince Caspian, but they stop short when they realize the prince is in the midst of a contentious war council. They listen from a distance and learn that another dwarf named Nikibrik has enlisted the help of a witch and a werewolf. Nikibrik’s plan is to call on the White Witch to defeat King Miraz. Caspian is not persuaded. For him, there can be no true victory if it is gained with evil. A fight thus ensues, and Peter, Edmund, and Trumpkin quickly join forces with the prince. When it’s all over, Nikibrik, the hag, and the werewolf are dead.

After some friendly introductions, Peter suggests challenging King Miraz to a sword fight in order to settle the war. Two of King Miraz’s men, who secretly desire power themselves, goad King Miraz into accepting the challenge despite the fact that victory is otherwise nearly assured for their side. He and Peter face off in a close sword fight with Narnians and Telmarines gathered around. One of the treasonous advisors kills his own king in a moment of confusion, and a full-fledged battle ensues from there. Thankfully, Aslan, Susan, and Lucy return just in time with reinforcements and win the day for Prince Caspian.

In the aftermath of the war, Aslan places a door frame on the field and offers the Telmarine people a chance to leave Narnia by walking through it. He explains that their people were not originally from Narnia or even Telmar but had accidentally found their way in from Earth through a magical passageway, one that no longer exists. The door frame will take them back to start a new life, if they so desire. Most of the Temarines do not trust Aslan, but one brave soldier steps forward and accepts Aslan’s offer. For doing so, Aslan proclaims him king in the new land to which they travel. The Telmarine king walks through the door frame and vanishes, setting an example that most others follow.

Prince Caspian is made King of Narnia, and the Pevensie children must say farewell and go back to the train station. Peter and Susan, as it turns out, must say goodbye forever. Aslan has told them they are too old to come back to Narnia. We are left to assume that Edmund and Lucy still have more adventures to follow, which do indeed play out in the next story.

REFLECTION

In Prince Caspian, C.S. Lewis forced my sons and me to think about the nature of Time. That’s not something a little child often thinks about beyond marking holidays and birthdays. Of course, they get excited about “being bigger,” but it takes a special sort of sensitivity to realize that it is also related to getting older and changing and ultimately moving toward death. I don’t shy away from talking about death with my sons, but that doesn’t mean it’s not still a tough topic.

One of them beams when we talk about Heaven. The other gets teary-eyed.

They had the same sort of reaction when we read about the near death and renewal of Narnia. The changes that it had undergone were sad and mysterious and exciting all at the same time. Then we had the change in the children themselves to think about. Peter, Susan, and Edmund couldn’t even see Aslan at first! What a mess everything seemed. But what a beautiful teaching moment it was for me as a parent.

I used the story to explain to them that while the physical things of the world will die away, the spiritual things will not. We saw this most readily in the structure of Cair Paravel, which I used as a metaphor for the Pevensie children themselves.  

Cair Paravel

Cair Paravel stands as the symbol of Narnia, both with regard to its worldly power and its spirituality as an Aslan-centered state. Since it is in ruins when Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy return to Narnia, we see just how low the kingdom had fallen. “Narnia” as the place and ideal it had been during its Golden Age is bankrupt; belief in Aslan is nearly extinguished.

Yet, despite having been completely abandoned, the treasure room of Cair Paravel remains intact. “How?” my sons and I wondered. “Why didn’t someone steal it?”

Of course there could be any number of hypothetical answers to this question, but it seems to me that the treasure room remains because it represents the very heart of Narnia, almost like a soul. Just as God marks His children with the waters of Baptism and claims them for Himself, the treasure in Cair Paravel is a sign of Aslan’s indelible mark on Narnia. Even if someone had wanted to steal it, it would have been impossible.

The Pevensies

Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy could claim the treasure, however, because it was theirs all along. With their prized swords and such in hand, they set out next to reclaim Narnia. The only problem is: all but Lucy have forgotten what the treasure means. It’s more than a testimony of their kingship and queenship. It’s even more than a sign of their duty to save Narnia. It’s first and foremost a sign of their duty to serve Aslan.

Lucy alone remembers this, and that’s why she is the only one to see Aslan when He first arrives. He wants to help them, but He can only do so if they cooperate with His will. Peter and Edmund have their own ideas about how to get to Aslan’s How, and Susan doesn’t seem all that committed to any particular direction.

When they do finally see Aslan one by one, they realize they hadn’t exactly wanted to see Him. We don’t know the specific reasons for this, but we can infer that something has changed in their lives over the last year in London. Maybe they feel too old to believe in Aslan. Maybe they’ve acted in ways that Aslan would not approve of. Or maybe it’s something else entirely. In any event, they had let the “Cair Paravel” of their lives begin to crumble.

Thankfully, Aslan had preserved His mark on the children just as he had preserved the treasure room of the castle. With help from Lucy, the older Pevensie children’s souls rekindle, and they remember their duty to serve Aslan. Only by putting that duty first are they able to save Narnia in the end.

What’s more, they realize Aslan is their only defense against the destructible hand of Time. Their own mortality, though not fully challenged until the final book in The Chronicles of Narnia, is very much at stake in this one. If they are ever going to gain eternal life, they must follow the Lion.

FINAL THOUGHTS

When I finished reading Prince Caspian to my sons, I paused to reflect on why it felt a little heavier than the other books, even than The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. I realized it was because my sons saw themselves as the Pevensies. Young though they are, they had somewhat taken it for granted that Aslan could defeat the White Witch just like Christ could defeat Sin and Death. Yes, Aslan’s sacrifice on the Stone Table was scary and powerful to read about, but they knew Aslan would be okay, not least because I could tell them that with certainty.

We couldn’t, however, take anything for granted when it came to the children. We knew every decision they made was of consequence to the success of their spiritual mission, and that kept the pages turning faster than ever.

It was also a little sad for my sons to learn that Peter and Susan would not go back to Narnia. Since I had read all of The Chronicles, I was able to assure them that Peter’s adventures would continue, but in a different way—a way consistent with the treasure that is Heaven. But for Susan, I had to start bracing them for a tough storyline, one I’ll talk about more in the final post of this series. I’ll save most of those thoughts for now, but suffice it to say, the implications of choosing to follow Aslan (or not) were very much on our minds as we prepared for the next book in the series.

(Here is another of my six-year-old son’s sentence diagrams, which I instructed him through during our reading of The Chronicles of Narnia. For more on a classical approach to learning grammar, visit my series here.)
Posted on by Stephanie McGann

Narnia #4: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

When I read The Chronicles of Narnia as a child, I started with The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe instead of The Magician’s Nephew. That was partly because I had seen the 1979 animated movie of it directed by Bill Melendez and already loved the story. It was also partly because there was another set of The Chronicles in my house that listed The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe as the first book.

So why the discrepancy? Which book is really first?

As I came to learn, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe was published first, followed by Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the “Dawn Treader,” The Silver Chair, The Horse and His Boy, The Magician’s Nephew, and The Last Battle.

In a letter to a boy named Laurence dated April 23, 1965, C.S. Lewis explained, “The series was not planned beforehand…When I wrote The Lion, [the Witch, and the Wardrobe] I did not know I was going to write any more. Then I wrote P.[rince] Caspian as a sequel and still didn’t think there would be any more, and when I had done The Voyage [of the “Dawn Treader”] I felt quite sure it would be the last. But I found I was wrong.” Lewis went on to explain that it didn’t really matter what order the series was read in. Nevertheless, he eventually told his publisher to re-order the books so they would be chronological according to Narnian time.

Reading them now to my five- and six-year-old sons, I like how Lewis changed it. It makes it a little easier to follow the storyline, which is helpful for young ones. It also elevates characters like Digory in a series that had originally seemed to me mostly about Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie. For my sons, Digory took the lead, but the Pevensies suffered none for it in their adoration.

Wherever you start, there is something central about The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. Like in the story of Salvation History, Christ’s Passion, Death, and Resurrection define everything that comes before and after it. That’s also the case with Aslan’s sacrifice on the Stone Table. Read on to learn the full story. In the reflection, I’ll talk about the role Faith and Reason play therein.

THE STORY

The story begins in a large house set in the English countryside during World War II. The house belongs to none other than Digory, who is now grownup and goes by the name of Professor Kirke. He has agreed to let four children from London stay with him to avoid the air raids there. Beginning with the oldest, their names are Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie.

They are a playful, good-natured group of children who accept their lot in stride—all but Edmund, that is. Though he goes exploring and plays games with the others, he is very sour and never seems to miss an opportunity to complain or tease.

Against this backdrop, Lucy hides in an obscure wooden wardrobe one rainy day during a game of hide-and-go-seek. She pushes her way deeper and deeper into the wardrobe, brushing past winter coats and expecting to reach its backside. But instead, she feels her way into a wintry forest and emerges on a snowy plain, desolate save for a lamppost.

Here Lucy does a brave thing. Rather than go back and search for the wardrobe, she walks toward the light. She soon sees a strange looking creature, one with the body of a man on top and the legs of a goat on the bottom. He turns out to be a faun and introduces himself as Mr. Tumnus, invites Lucy to join him for tea at his house, and explains they are in the Kingdom of Narnia. Lucy gratefully accepts only to later find out that he had been luring her there with evil purposes. Mr. Tumnus was in the pay of a wicked queen, known as the White Witch, who is the very same Jadis that Digory and Polly let into Narnia in The Magician’s Nephew. Living in fear of a prophecy about two Sons of Adam and two Daughters of Eve overthrowing her power, she had put Mr. Tumnus (and presumably others) on the lookout should any humans enter her kingdom. As such, Mr. Tumnus had been planning on capturing Lucy. Upon getting to know her, though, he has a change of heart and confesses his evil plan. Lucy, whose goodness seems infinite, forgives him and hastily sets back for the wardrobe.

When she joins Peter, Susan, and Edmund in Professor Kirke’s house, she tells them about her adventure, but they think she is making it all up. It must have been a game! They check the wardrobe just to be sure and find the back of it intact. Lucy is terribly upset by their lack of faith in her and has no way to explain why the wardrobe no longer leads to Narnia.

A few days later, they play hide-and-go-seek again. Lucy hides in the wardrobe and excitedly follows it all the way to Mr. Tumnus’s house. When she is done visiting, she discovers her brother Edmund by the lamppost.  

What Lucy does not know is that while she was having tea with Mr. Tumnus, Edmund was having Turkish delight with the White Witch. Worse still, he was giving into a terrible temptation. Intoxicated with the prospect of gaining power in her court and being better than his siblings, he had agreed to bring them to her. He does not know that she plans to do them harm, but he does have a vague idea that they will not be in her favor—certainly not like himself. And so he makes his secret pact.

What’s more, when he gets back to Professor Kirke’s house, Edmund lies about being in Narnia and says that it was all pretend. Lucy is utterly distressed at this point, and Peter and Susan wonder if the time away from their parents is making her delusional. Not knowing what else to do, they seek the counsel of Professor Kirke.

After hearing their concerns, he concludes that Lucy is probably telling the truth. His logic goes a little something like this: Lucy does not lie. She says Narnia is real. Hence, you should believe her about Narnia.

All four of the Pevensies end up in the wardrobe one day soon thereafter when they are hiding from the professor’s maid. This time, the wardrobe leads all of them into Narnia, and Susan and Peter doubt Lucy no longer. For his part, Edmund admits that he really had been there, but he still keeps quiet about meeting the White Witch.

Lucy escorts them to Mr. Tumnus’s house, but he is not there. A mysterious talking beaver known simply as Mr. Beaver leads them to his home. Along with Mrs. Beaver, they explains that Mr. Tumnus’s meeting with Lucy was found out by the White Witch, and he was arrested for treason. Lucy feels responsible, and the children agree that they should do their best to help Mr. Tumnus. Mr. and Mrs. Beaver explain that Aslan, the Great Lion, is on the move. He alone can stand against the White Witch, and they decide to seek Him out. Meanwhile, Edmund slips away to find the White Witch. His betrayal soon becomes known, but it is too late to go after him.

Instead, the party continues on in search of Aslan. Along the way, they meet Father Christmas. His presence is the first of many signs that the White Witch’s power is declining. Father Christmas gives the children gifts for their fight against the White Witch. To Peter, he gives a sword; to Susan, a bow with arrows and a horn; to Lucy, a dagger and a diamond vial filled with a healing potion. Soon the snow begins to melt, and Spring sets in just as they meet Aslan Himself.

Meanwhile, Edmund meets the White Witch. Her castle is nothing like what he had expected. It is dreary and scary and full of very life-like stone statues of various creatures, including a lion that he rudely draws on. The White Witch is mad at him for not bringing his siblings and treats him much differently than during their first encounter. Edmund realizes that she has no intention of making him important in her court. She won’t even give him more Turkish delight. Instead, she takes him prisoner and plans to use him in the battle with Aslan. They set forth in the Witch’s sleigh but must disembark when there is no snow left to slide upon.

By the time they join the battle, the Witch’s side has already suffered their first loss. Peter, armed with the sword given him by Father Christmas, killed the Witch’s top wolf. Many others on her side fell at the hands of the Narnians. Knowing defeat in a straight battle is inevitable, the White Witch uses Edmund as a hostage. She will release him in exchange for Aslan. The bargain is struck, though none of the children know it. All they know is that Aslan has saved Edmund.

Later that night, Susan and Lucy see Aslan walking away from their camp, and they decide to follow Him. He discovers their presence right away and invites them to join Him. He is filled with a deep sadness, and the company of the girls brings Him comfort. When He nears the Witch’s camp, He makes them leave, but the girls look on from a distance. What they see horrifies them. Aslan is mocked and shaved and tied down to a stone table. A snap of His jaw could have ended it all, but Aslan restrains Himself, ultimately letting the White Witch stab Him dead. The jeering crowd eventually breaks up, but Lucy and Susan can’t bear to leave their Beloved Lion. They approach Him with tears in their eyes and do what they can to restore His dignity. Mice come along and chew away the ropes that tied Him.

Then, a wonder happens! Aslan rises with the Sun in a single mighty bound. As it turns out, He is stronger than the Witch, stronger than Death itself. He explains to the jubilant Lucy and Susan that His new life comes from having sacrificed Himself. The Witch had not known the true extent of His powers.

After playing with Aslan and celebrating His resurrection, the girls ride on the Lion’s back in a glorious race across the countryside to the White Witch’s castle. He breathes on all the stone statues there, including the lion Edmund had defaced and Mr. Tumnus and all sorts of other wonderful creatures, and they awaken back to life in their natural form. Now with their numbers increased, Aslan races to join Peter and Edmund and the rest of the Narnian army. Almost instantly upon their arrival, Aslan swallows up the Witch, and her side is defeated at last.

According to Peter, Edmund was the great hero of the battle. He disarmed the White Witch of her wand, thereby preventing her from turning the entire army to stone before Aslan’s reinforcements. In the process, however, Edmund was greatly wounded. Aslan instructs Lucy to give her brother some of the healing potion, which sets him right again. She then gives it out to the other wounded Narnians.

The children are made Kings and Queens of Narnia, with Peter having the special title of High King. They grow up in a matter of pages, leaving us to wonder about all the great things they did, until one day they begin a royal hunt. They chase a white stag far into their kingdom and stop all of sudden when they see a lamppost. Their memories are fuzzy. Somehow, they know they have seen it before, but they can’t quite place how or when. The stag looks at them and darts into the woods, beckoning them on. King Peter, King Edmund, Queen Susan, and Queen Lucy sense they are at a crossroads and feel uncertain what they should do.

King Edmund encourages them to take the adventure that presents itself, meaning they should follow the stag. They do, and find themselves suddenly back in the wardrobe, young children again, barely minutes after they had left Professor Kirke’s house in the first place. They tell him about their adventure, and the wise old man believes every word of it.   

REFLECTION

There are so many directions a parent or teacher could take The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, but much of the discussion I had with my sons revolved around the intersection of Faith and Reason. Both are important for a Christian: Faith moves the heart toward God, while Reason moves the mind toward Him.

Ideally, we would all have an equal share of both, but that is simply not the case for most of us. C.S. Lewis seemed to know this. He presents this disparity through his characters. My sons and I looked at Lucy as the embodiment of Faith and Professor Kirke as the embodiment of Reason.

Lucy Pevensie

Believing in Narnia comes easily for our young heroine. Lucy goes there, after all. She sees it for herself. How could she not believe in it?

But then again, it’s her Faithful disposition that makes her able to go to Narnia in the first place. This is not immediately clear in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, but reading the full series (especially Prince Caspian) shows that believing sometimes precedes seeing. Lucy has the gift of Faith, and that opens a new world to her even when it is closed to others. 

At times, however, Lucy’s disposition borders on gullibility. This is most obvious when she accepts Mr. Tumnus’s invitation for tea. No matter how many times I’ve read the story, this part still makes me uneasy. He’s a stranger! Why does she trust him? Worse yet, she shouldn’t have trusted him because he was going to turn her over to the White Witch. Mr. Tumnus was a bad guy…that is until he saw Lucy’s goodness and had his own change of heart.  

Therein lies another point about Faith. It sees things hidden; it even sees the invisible. Lucy’s belief in Mr. Tumnus’s goodness brought out the goodness in him. He really was a good sort of faun, but he had lost his way. Through Lucy, he found it again.

One caveat—I am not saying that believing in something makes it true. A lie is a lie no matter how much someone believes it. What I am saying is that a person of Faith can see the Truth of something more clearly and draw it out into the open.

That’s precisely what Lucy does for her siblings, too. She insists Narnia is a real place, even though she suffers greatly for it. She could have easily abandoned her idea, but she doesn’t. She sticks to it and patiently waits for the Truth to prevail. And it does, of course. Her siblings eventually get into Narnia themselves and apologize for not believing Lucy.

Better still, believing their sister was the first step toward believing in Aslan, the Logos Incarnate as a Lion. It’s no wonder Lucy holds a special place in Aslan’s heart. She was His first evangelist.

Professor Kirke

Just as Lucy is the embodiment of Faith, Professor Kirke—named for C.S. Lewis’s childhood tutor Professor W. T. Kirkpatrick—is the embodiment Reason. We see this in his scholarly disposition and even more pointedly in his conversations with the children.  

When Peter and Susan are worried that Lucy is either lying about Narnia or has perhaps gone crazy, he surprisingly dismisses their concerns. Here you might be thinking that Professor Kirke readily believes Lucy because he had been to Narnia as a child. His belief, then, is not really about Reason, you might say. True, he has that advantage, but he still very much uses Reason to prove to Peter and Susan that Narnia is real. The basis of his argument goes something like this:

Is Lucy known to be truthful? Yes.

Is Edmund known to be truthful? No.

Therefore, you should believe Lucy, not Edmund.  

Okay, what if she is telling the truth in her own way, but she doesn’t really know what is true or not because she has gone mad. In other words, is Lucy crazy? No, nothing about her being suggests that.

Okay, still, there are some oddities about her story. Lucy says she was gone for hours in Narnia, but it was really just seconds that she was in the wardrobe. That doesn’t make sense. Of course it doesn’t, which is precisely why she wouldn’t have made it up! The time difference between Narnia and London is too complicated a thing for a little girl to imagine. And if she had, she would have been more likely to have hidden for a while before announcing her return from Narnia.

And there you have it. Lucy must be telling the truth, and Narnia must be real.

When Peter and Susan leave Professor Kirke, they feel terribly out of sorts. The conclusion they are left with defies common sense—or at least what Peter and Susan believe to be common sense. Other worlds don’t exist. Everybody knows that.

But the Professor has done his job. By challenging the children with Reason, they are no longer able to simply dismiss Lucy and her Narnia. They have to face the conclusion that it might be real because they can’t prove otherwise. And—it’s my view—this intrusion of Reason into their minds is what allows them to walk through the wardrobe and experience Narnia for themselves.

After the children return from Narnia at the end of the book, the good professor kindly listens to their adventure, which now has much more at stake than questioning whether or not another world called Narnia exists. Also in question is whether talking animals and fauns and witches really exist. Even if they can prove that, they must also prove that one of the talking animals—Aslan—died and came back to life.  That’s a lot for someone to believe without seeing!

Nevertheless, Professor Kirke accepts the children’s story with sincere belief and meets their surprise with his oft-repeated refrain, “What do schools teach children these days?” The implication, of course, is that schools are not teaching children how to use Reason properly. If they did, they would not be at all surprised by the conclusions that follow from it.

And what is the central conclusion of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe? It is this: God Incarnate has conquered sin and death. Though we may go astray and fall under the spell of White Witches from time to time, He will give His life to bring us back.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Let’s close with some final thoughts about Edmund. He did not seem to have a disposition toward Faith, nor did he have Professor Kirke instructing him in the art of Reason. So how did he get into Narnia (before Susan and Peter we might add), and why did Aslan save him of all people?

The answer my sons and I came up with is that Aslan, the Master of both Faith and Reason, simply brought him there out of Love. We likened Edmund to that of a Saul turned St. Paul. Unable to come to Aslan on his own, Aslan brought Edmund to Himself.

I tried to help my children see that he is not really a Judas-figure, which is what I had thought of him as a child. He’s a little boy who needs direction. Though he was lacking in Faith and Reason, he got the greatest gift of all—Aslan’s life in exchange for his own.

(Here is another of my six-year-old son’s sentence diagrams, which I instructed him through during our reading of The Chronicles of Narnia. For more on a classical approach to learning grammar, visit my series here.)

Source: Dorest, Lyle W. and Marjorie Lamp, eds. C.S. Lewis’ Letters to Children, Mead. Scribner: New York, 1996.

Posted on by Stephanie McGann

Narnia #3: The Magician’s Nephew

Reading The Magician’s Nephew with my five- and six-year-old sons was a magical experience in itself. They fell in love with the story and its characters, and I found myself falling in love with them all over again, too. In this post, I am going to share an overview of the story and then go into some of the things we talked about as we read it.

THE STORY

The Magician’s Nephew is the first novel in The Chronicles of Narnia, though it was actually published fifth. It tells the story of how Narnia was created and reveals the special role of two children in its making. Though Polly is the leading lady, the story really belongs to Digory. It is he who seeks healing for his sick mother. With his father away in India, he is forced to live with his Uncle Andrew and Aunt Letty, unmarried siblings. Digory mopes about in a fog of misery until he meets Polly.

They become friends and accidentally sneak into Uncle Andrew’s private study. This is a happy chance for Uncle Andrew. A crazed magician, he tricks Polly into putting on a magical yellow ring that sends her into an unknown world with no way home. Then he offers Digory a chance to save her by giving him another yellow ring to go after her with plus two green rings for each of them to get home. Feeling he has very little choice, Digory accepts the rings and follows Polly.

He finds her sleeping in a quiet woods spotted with pools, called the Wood Between the Worlds. They discover that each of the pools leads to a different world. After carefully marking the pool that leads back home to London, they jump into another and land in the World of Charn. The buildings are in ruins and the Sun is red. They would have done well to leave, but their curiosity gets the better of them. They walk into a large room and find a row of people like wax statues the size of giants sitting in a long line. None of them appear to be alive. As they examine their faces, they see that they get increasingly uglier and scarier as they go down the line.

They also find a bell that strangely beckons them to ring it. Polly doesn’t want to, but Digory does. He fights with her, strikes the bell, and awakens the last in the line of the wax people—a giant woman styled as a queen. She is Empress Jadis, and she immediately sets in motion a plan to leave with the children and take over their world. Charn, as it turns out, is dying. Unable to get away from Jadis, she follows them back to London and meets Uncle Andrew.

He is captivated by Jadis and enters into her service. Jadis abuses him horribly, but Uncle Andrew seems not to mind all that much. He calls her a “dem fine woman,” dresses up in his best suit, sips a few adult beverages, and takes her out gallivanting around town. She ends up stealing jewelry from a shop, believing herself entitled to all of it. The police pursue her and Uncle Andrew as they flee in a horse-drawn cab. Uncle Andrew tries to make a break for it, but Jadis stays and fights off her apprehenders with shocking strength.

Meanwhile, Digory and Polly make a plan to transport Jadis out of London, back to the Woods Between the Worlds, and force her into another pool. They put on their rings and grab her. Because of all the chaos, they end up bringing a chain of connected people and things, including not only Jadis but also Uncle Andrew, the Cabbie (Frank), his horse (Strawberry), and a lamppost. The world they enter is completely black. Jadis gleefully explains it’s a new world and relishes the prospect of ruling it.

No sooner do they realize this, then they hear a beautiful song and the darkness begins to give way to a soft light, and the landscape begins to take shape, complete with mountains and rivers and trees and all manner of plants and flowers. Even the lamppost that Jadis had ripped from the ground in London takes roots in the rich earth. Then a golden Lion appears, and they realize He is the one singing the world into life. Jadis runs away in fear of the Lion. Uncle Andrew hides from the Lion. But the others—Digory, Polly, the Cabbie, and Strawberry—stay and listen. They watch as creatures appear. The Lion makes some of them talking animals, and they gather around Him with great love and reverence. After watching all of this unfold, Digory decides he wants to talk to the Lion and see if He might help his dying mother.

The Lion, whose name is Aslan, tells Digory that he must make amends for bringing Jadis to Narnia. He is to get an apple from a special tree in a far-off Garden and bring it back to plant as protection from her evil. Polly joins Digory on this mission, and they ride on Strawberry, now transformed into a talking, flying horse. When they arrive at the Garden, Digory sets off alone to retrieve the apple. He must pass through a gate in doing so, and he reads a placard which says:

Come in by the gold gates or not at all,
Take of my fruit for others or forbear,
For those who steal or those who climb my wall
Shall find their heart’s desire and find despair.

Just as Digory picks an apple, he sees Jadis perched in the special tree with apple juice dripping down from her mouth. He can tell she has gotten her heart’s desire, and that has made her even more evil. Jadis then tempts him to steal one of the apples for his mother, claiming it would make her better. Digory thinks about it but overcomes his desire and joins the others.

They return to Aslan, plant the apple, and a beautiful apple tree grows instantaneously. Aslan then offers one of the apples to Digory for his mother. He also instructs Digory to bury the rings so no one will ever find them again.

Digory does as Aslan commands, buries the rings, and gives the apple to his mother. She is healed, and his life is restored to happiness.

As for the other characters, the Cabbie gets to bring his wife to Narnia and become their first king and queen. And Uncle Andrew gets back to London with the children. He doesn’t really remember Narnia when he returns, but he is much improved. He’s a lot nicer than he used to be and has only a clouded memory of Jadis, whom he still thinks of as a “dem fine woman.”

REFLECTION

One of my favorite motifs in The Magician’s Nephew is appearance versus reality. Some of the characters, like Uncle Andrew and Empress Jadis, do not see the world at all properly. Even Digory and Polly see it properly in only a limited way at first. Here is how I discussed this motif with my sons.

Uncle Andrew and Jadis

Uncle Andrew’s view of things was hard to peg in the first few chapters of the book. My sons and I were right there with Digory and Polly, wondering if Uncle Andrew was really a madman. He certainly seemed strange, but it wasn’t clear that he wasn’t just misunderstood until Digory and Polly accidentally found themselves in his private study and got sent away by the rings. To Uncle Andrew, Polly and Digory were no more than guinea pigs in a crazy experiment.

Okay, we decided at that point; he’s definitely a madman. As it turns out, he’s also a bad guy.

What’s more, we decided his madness had to do with the state of his heart. He can’t see people as they are because he only sees them for what they can give him. For example, he believes Jadis is a “dem fine woman,” but she’s really an evil giant of a witch. He also thinks she might fall in love with him and make him an equal in her royal court. The only problem is that she keeps calling him “slave” and “dog” and threatening to hurt him. His delusions about Jadis defy logic.

Uncle Andrew is also unable to understand the Talking Animals in Narnia. To him, they sound like beasts, and he is utterly terrified of being eaten by them. His entire time in Narnia is spent worried that he is going to be eaten. His greatest fear, not surprisingly, is of “the Lion.” Although Uncle Andrew’s time there is really quite sad, it is also full of humor. We had our fair share of laughs about the ridiculous things Uncle Andrew does in Narnia, especially when he is planted like a tree, but we also found ourselves cheering for him to be reformed.  

We never cheered for Jadis, though. Like Uncle Andrew, she is utterly disconnected from the world around her. We saw this most obviously when she is in London, and it’s not just because she is an outsider, dressed in funny clothes, who happens to be the size of a giant. She also treats everyone there like her lowly subjects and can’t appreciate why they don’t respond to her power.

The characters of Uncle Andrew and Jadis are great examples of how selfishness distorts our true nature. It takes us into a false reality, almost like another world itself, in which we cannot see things for what they are. Though Uncle Andrew is not as evil as Jadis and ends up becoming a better person by the end of the book, he nonetheless never manages to let go entirely of his false ideas of grandeur in the service of Jadis.

At least, as my sons pointed out, he turned out better than he started.

Digory and Polly

When we first met Digory, he was feeling very bad for himself, and we were all wondering how he would manage his difficulties. As we know from the summary above, he had a lot to deal with, especially being so young.  

But behind Digory’s miserable exterior is a hope against hope. Just maybe, his mom will get better. Just maybe, there is more to life than what he sees around him. My sons and I certainly felt Digory’s great yearning right along with him.

Digory gets his first glimpse of a bigger world over his garden wall. There he finds Polly, a little girl about his own age. Interestingly, they both notice the dirt on the other’s face but not on their own. (My sons thought that was hysterical.) Despite any grievances about the other’s hygiene, they become good friends. Their games offer Digory a measure of relief from his miseries, and he begins to look forward to their imaginative adventures. But reality hits imagination in the face when they wind up in Uncle Andrew’s study.  

Two things happen simultaneously for Digory when he accepts Uncle Andrew’s magic rings. First, he realizes there are countless other worlds waiting to be explored. Second, he learns that some hardships are worth pursuing for the sake of others. Thus begins the transformation of his worldview.

Upon finding Polly in the Wood Between the Worlds, the two children become even better friends. More than just playmates, they become one another’s companions in a life-threatening adventure. They look out for each other and steer each other accordingly. For example, when they first meet Jadis, Digory doesn’t realize at first that she is bad. Polly, on the other hand, picks up on it right away because Jadis keeps looking past her and treating her like she’s not even there. Polly is not simply offended by this, but it puts her on alert. She rightly senses that Jadis is only paying attention to Digory because he can get them out of Charn and into another world worth ruling. Funny enough, Jadis eventually looks past Digory, too, and he realizes just how correct Polly was.

When it comes to Aslan, Digory and Polly know He is good. Despite the fact that He is a Lion, and in their world lions would be very scary, they approach Him without fear of being eaten. That’s not to say they’re not scared. They are, but for a different reason. They are scared because they know Aslan will not look past them. Rather, He will look at them so deeply as to see them as they really are, dirty faces and all. In turn, they will be forced to see themselves through His eyes. Happily, what they see are not merely two good little children but a Son of Adam and a Daughter of Eve.

As such, they receive their birthright in the form of an apple from Narnia’s version of the Garden of Eden. But the apple is not just any apple; it’s a magical apple. And it’s not just magical in the cheap way Uncle Andrew uses magic. Nor is it magical in the selfish way of Jadis. It’s magical according to the nature of Aslan: it is life-giving. Digory feeds it to his mother, and she is miraculously healed. Better still, Digory knows now that an earthly death cannot kill his mother. She, too, is a Daughter of Eve and shall have eternal life.

With this realization, Digory’s worldview is fully transformed into that of a Narnian, which is to say that of a Christian. The hope that he held in his heart of hearts is realized. There is more to the world than what he first knew at the beginning of the book, and there is most certainly more to it than what he knows at the end of the book. He has learned that reality is more than what he can see.

FINAL THOUGHTS

My sons begged me to start The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe the same night we finished The Magician’s Nephew. It was late, so I made them wait. They carried the book down the next morning and got the first chapter out of me before breakfast. They were hungry for more just like Digory.

That’s one of my favorite aspects of The Chronicles of Narnia. They are every bit the page turner that makes a good book, and yet they offer so much more than an exciting plot. They are also full of deep mystery that stirs the soul and makes it yearn for the Good, the True, and the Beautiful.

(Here is another of my six-year-old son’s sentence diagrams, which I instructed him through during our reading of The Chronicles of Narnia. For more on a classical approach to learning grammar, visit my series here.)

Posted on by Stephanie McGann

Narnia #1: Beloved Reading for a New Generation

There is something extra special about reading the classics with my children. When I found my old collection of The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis during a much-needed basement purge, I couldn’t resist bringing them up to bedtime. I read a lot of “bigger books” like these with my five- and six-year-old sons, so I knew they would be able to pay attention long enough to understand the story.

But I didn’t know they would become obsessed with it. 

A few pages into The Magician’s Nephew and they were hooked. Bedtime or not, they constantly asked me to read it. And when I wasn’t reading it, they were talking about it nonstop. At one point when they were sharing some Narnia knowledge with their father, he very seriously told them they needed to play more sports and promptly started up a wiffle ball game of baseball. Point taken.

I guess I’d gotten a little obsessed myself. The Chronicles of Narnia are just so magical and teachable. Now that we’ve finished the series and gotten back a more balanced approach to family time, I want to share some of the lessons I took away as a parent reading these books with my children.

Unlike my other book-related blog posts that break down storylines and characters and motifs with the classroom in mind, I have designed this one more like a family journal. I only have one entry for each of the seven novels in the series, plus an additional entry that offers an approach to reading the stories. There is much more to say about each of the books, but I tried to limit myself to the ideas that resonated most with my own children.

This post will serve as the table of contents for the series. Just click on the titles below, and it will lead you to the entries as I post them.

An Exercise in Supposition and Imagination

The Magician’s Nephew

The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

The Horse and His Boy

Prince Caspian

The Voyage of the “Dawn Treader”

The Silver Chair

The Last Battle

With all the other information out there about The Chronicles of Narnia, I hope what I have to share will be of some added value. If nothing else, I hope it encourages you to dig them out of your basement.

(We also used the stories to practice classifying and diagramming sentences. In the first picture, SN stands for “subject noun,” and V stands for “verb.” For more on a classical approach to learning grammar, visit my series here.)