Volume 8 Number 1 Article 1

4-15-1981

C.S. Lewis and George MacDonald: The Silver Chair and the Princess Books

Michael C. Kotzin

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Recommended Citation Kotzin, Michael C. (1981) "C.S. Lewis and George MacDonald: The Silver Chair and the Princess Books," Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: Vol. 8 : No. 1 , Article 1. Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol8/iss1/1

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Mythopoeic Society at SWOSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature by an authorized editor of SWOSU Digital Commons. An ADA compliant document is available upon request. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To join the Mythopoeic Society go to: http://www.mythsoc.org/join.htm Mythcon 51: A VIRTUAL “HALFLING” MYTHCON July 31 - August 1, 2021 (Saturday and Sunday) http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-51.htm

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Abstract Examines The Silver Chair in the light of two George MacDonald works which it resembles in many ways and which Lewis included in his list of MacDonald’s six “great works,” The Princess and the Goblin and The Princess and Curdie.

Additional Keywords Fairy tales—Influence on C.S. Lewis; airF y tales—Influence on George MacDonald; Lewis, C.S. The Silver Chair—Sources; MacDonald, George. The Princess and Curdie—Influence on The Silver Chair; MacDonald, George. The Princess and the Goblin—Influence on The Silver Chair; Barbara Mann; Tim Kirk; Edith Crowe

This article is available in Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol8/iss1/1 C.S. LEWIS AND GEORGE MacDONALD: THE SILVER CHAIR AND THE PRINCESS BOOKS MICHAEL C. KOTZIN

Introducing a collection of selected passages from carnate in the whole story."5 This being Lewis' position, it George MacDonald in 1996, C.S. Lewis wrote: "I have never is worthwhile to begin by noticing ways that the story of concealed the fact that I regarded him as my masters indeed his book resem bles the stories of MacDonald’s books. I fancy I have never w ritten a book in which I did not quote from him. But it has not seemed to me that those who have Thus, not only do The Silver Chair and The Princess and received my books kindly take even now sufficient notice of the Goblin include action set in an underground world; the the affiliatio n ."1 It is a striking acknowledgement by a actions too are rather sim ilar. In MacDonald's book the modern w riter of his debt to a V ictorian forebear and of underground world is found in "hollow places" w ithin moun­ course the debt has not gone unobserved by a great many tain s, "huge caverns, and winding ways, some with water run­ critics. But it still has not been investigated as fully as ning through them, and some shining with a ll colours of the it might have been. For example, a book like The Silver rainbow when a light was taken in .... Now in these subter­ Chair, which, along with the six other Chronicles of Narnia, ranean caverns lived a strange race of beings, called by Lewis wrote soon after he made his statem ent, has many some gnomes, by some kobolds, by some goblins.The g o b ­ specific connections with MacDonald's work which have not lin s, led by their king and aggressive queen, are served by yet been "sufficiently noticed," even by Roger Lancelyn their beastly domestic anim als. Men, who are mining the Green and W alter Hooper, two major authorities on the mountains, know about these caverns, and one of the miners, Narnian books, who in th eir biography of Lewis turn many a boy named Curdie, discovers that a plot is being hatched stones in speculating that Underland in The Silver Chair by the goblins, who want to revenge them selves upon the might have been suggested to Lewis by books by Haggard, people on earth as a reprisal for the wrongs done to their Joseph O 'N eill, Verne, Bulwer Lytton, and even seventeenth ancestors. They plan to dig their way out of a certain and eighteenth century w riters such as Athanasius Kircher mountain so that they can enter a castle on it in which the and Ludwig Hol berg, but ignore MacDonald as a source of it kingdom's princess dw ells. Their aim is to steal her and or of any other specific aspects of the Lewis book.2 made her the wife of their prince, thereby gaining some power over the people. If they fa il in that scheme then Surely Green and Hooper are right to say of the Narnian they w ill flood the mines and drown the miners. But as series that "again and again one can find echoes from legend m atters develop Curdie, at one point rescued from the cav­ and litera tu re, ancient and modern—and those of us who have erns by the princess herself, helps thwart the plan to kid­ 'read the right books' w ill find more than those who have nap the princess and the miners block the water so that their not." But I do not think that they are equally right when mines are not flooded but instead the natural caverns are, they go on to say that "such echoes are of little impor­ and many goblins are drowned. tance, save to suggest what books Lewis had read or to make us marvel at his wide reading and retentive memory."3 Lewis' Underland is larger and more developed, allowing Lewis’ remark should make us realize that MacDonald is not for ship travel and holding entire cities, but it is a simi­ ju st any one of a great many w riters, some known, some ob­ lar underground kingdom, With a population which also in­ scure, whom we can find echoes of in Lewis if we happen to cludes soft-footed gnomes (who in th is case have been brought have read them. Lewis deliberately paid homage to MacDonald from an even lower underground world, and here serve the as his m aster, and to find the MacDonald in a Lewis work is queen because she has enchanted them), and a ruler who is to give the earlier w riter his due, as Lewis wanted us to. the enemy of the inhabitants of the daylight world outside. Nor is Lewis' connection with MacDonald to be treated as in­ Here the underground ruler is a queen, who a lready had cidental to our understanding of Lewis' "children's" books. succeeded in kidnapping R ilian, the Prince of Narnia, ten By elaborating on the connection we are able to see Lewis years before the action of the book begins. She h as h eld not only as a disciple of this one w riter but also as an him under a spell, and her plan is to take over Narnia, the author self-consciously working in a certain literary tradi­ outside kingdom, with him as figurehead king, m arried to tion, one which originated in the nineteenth century and has her. Here too the underground army is digging its way out continued to generate works of great power in our own age. of the underworld and is close to making a move when two We thus affirm Lewis' traditionalism and MacDonald's contin­ children, again a boy and a g irl but here with an additional uing value. We see Lewis in a literary context in which he helper, enter the underground world and make possible the belongs and we recognize that MacDonald is a w riter s till frustration of her designs. And here too a flooding of the well worth turning to in his own right. Finally, these underground caverns is a secondary plan; in this case the w riters are sim ilar but not identical, and by noticing dif­ flooding occurs as planned, but to no one's harm as the ferences between them we are able to see each of them more prince and children escape to above from the Underland and clearly. Therefore I propose to examine The Silver Chair in as the gnomes too escape, to their own world. the light of two George MacDonald works which it resem bles in many ways and which Lewis him self included in his lis t of Thus, Lewis might well have been drawing upon The Prin­ MacDonald's six "great works." The Princess and the Goblin cess and the Goblin when he was w riting The Silver Chair, and The Princess and Curdie.4 especially as he was planning its plot and designing its setting in the underworld, whence would come an enemy of the In praising MacDonald, Lewis sees him particularly as a "sunlit lands" whose evil plan, involving marriage of a day­ maker of "myths." "Most myths," Lewis says, "were made in lig h t prince to underground royalty, would be thwarted by prehistoric tim es, and, I suppose, not consciously made by brave children. And there are also sim ilarities to the se­ individuals at a ll. But every now and then there occurs in quel to MacDonald's book. The Princess and Curdie. the modern world a genius—a Kafka or a N ovalis—who can make such a story. Macdonald is the greatest genius of this Like that book, The Silver Chair leads into its main kind whom I know." Myths, as Lewis sees them, take the form action as a child reveals a flaw in character for which he of "a particular pattern of events." In MacDonald's "great is chastised. In MacDonald's book Curdie, now a b it cider w orks,... the meaning, the suggestion, the radiance, is in­ and less thoughtful, is proud of his sk ills in archery and 5 imaginary creature, a "M arsh-wiggle" with the name of Puddleglum. Overcoming danger with the help of Lina, Curdie makes his way to the court city of Gwyntystorm. He there confronts cruel, selfish people who make him a prisoner un­ til he escapes from them. J ill and Eustace, misled by the Queen of Underland, whom they have unknowingly met, make their way to the giants of Harfang, who plan to eat them, but the children escape from them. Curdie uses his mining tool and experience to escape from his cell, whence he drops down through a cave into a hole which leads him into the royal castle. He there discovers the king, stricken with an illness which is sim ilar to enchantment but which is actu­ ally caused by poison adm inistered by disloyal, am bitious subjects. Curdie now knows why he has been sent. Lewis' children, in escaping from the giants, enter Underland via a hole, and they soon find the prince, the object of their m ission, whose enchantment leaves him lik e MacDonald’s king, unaware of what is really happening around him. Curdie stops the poisoning and helps the king regain his health, strength, and sanity, and J ill and Eustace help R ilian get free of his spell. A primary villain in The Princess and Curdie, the doctor, is decidedly snake-like beneath the skin (see PC, pp. 139-, 139, 158)! Lewis' Queen of Underland, in her attem pt to reassert her power over the prince, actually turns into a snake (a transform ation with even greater echoes of MacDonald's L ilith ). In The Princess and Curdie the great-great-grandm other reappears to revive the king and, in a different form, to help him, Curdie, and the few other good people there are in that book to win a final b attle.7 In The Silver Chair Prince R ilian is freed from his enchantment after he evokes the name of Aslan, and he and his helpers subsequently destroy the queen. And so the pleased when he shoots a pigeon. In Lewis' book J ill Pole is two m issions have sim ilar happy results. Thanks to one a proud of her ability to stand near the edge of a cliff and king is able to reassume his power; thanks to the other a is scornful of Eustace Scrubb, who is too frightened to do prince is returned to his domains, where he becomes king so. In both books the offending child is then humbled and upon the death of his father. made to repent as a supernatural figure guides him or her to see what he has done, and the supernatural figure then sends The sto ries told by MacDonald and Lewis resem ble not the child on a m ission which provides the main action of each only one another but also many narratives in the tradition b o o k . which is the ultim ate source for both w riters, the tradition of the folk fairy tale. ("I turned to fairy tales," Lewis Curdi e, holding the pigeon he has k illed , remembers the later wrote, "because that seemed the form which certain Princess Irene's great-great-grandm other, a strange woman ideas and images in my mind seemed "to demand."8 ) Indeed, who, during the period covered by The Princess and the Gob­ the story of a young hero's going on a quest is one of the lin , lived upstairs in the castle occupied by Irene and kept most common of a ll narrative patterns in traditional fairy pigeons there. He feels guilty and he goes to look for the tales. In his M otif-Index of Folk L iterature. S tith Thomp­ old woman. Finding her, he receives guidance in moral be­ son has a listin g for the kind of quest which provides the havior, guidance of a kind which clearly appealed to Lewis, main m otif of The Silver Chair, HI3 8 5 .IO, the "Quest for lo st who, unlike most readers, includes among his lis t of Mac­ prince (king)." And a particular fairy tale found in Eng­ D onald's "great works" The Wise Woman, a book which entirely land which can be looked at for interesting parallels to revolves around the way two young g irls are given lessons in The Silver Chair is the story of "Child Rowland."9 ("Child character improvement by a "wise woman." In several of the Rowland" is based around M otifs H1 3 8 5 .I, "Quest for stolen Narnian books (for example, The Lion, the W itch, and the princess," and H13 8 5 . 6 , "Quest for lost sister"; the dif­ Wardrobe and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader) a main m otif is ference between it and The Silver Chair is that the object the curing by the lion Aslan of a wayward child, and in The of the quest in Lewis' book is a man who is the victim of a Silver Chair, as in The Princess and Curdie. such a m otif B elle Dame Sans M erci, a witch who enthralls him .) appears early, as Aslan quickly confronts J ill with the con­ sequences of her action and leads her to want to correct her­ self. Eustace, trying to save her, has fallen off the In "Child Roland" three brothers are playing with a c liff, but Aslan appears and uses his powerful breath to ball. Their sister Ellen disappears and the oldest brother carry him down to Narnia safely, then leads J ill to admit goes to the "Warluck M erlin" to find out what has happened that she "'was showing o ff'" and te lls her to "'do so no to her. He is told that she has been "carried away by the m ore,"' "'B ut,'" he goes on to say, ’"your task w ill be fairies, and is now in the castle of the king of Elf land." the harder because of what you have done'" (SC,p. 28). M erlin gives the brother instructions to follow in order to find her, but he fa ils to follow them and does not return. The "task" which Aslan then informs her of (and it is The pattern is then repeated with the second brother, but so central that Chapter 2 is called "Jill is Given a Task") when the youngest brother's turn comes he does what he is leads J ill and Eustace into adventures sim ilar to those en­ supposed to (as Curdie does and as J ill and Eustace finally countered by Curdie (who later has the young princess as his do after failing to follow the first of their instructions partner) when he sets forth on what the title of his book's from Aslan and having trouble with the second and th ird ). eighth chapter calls "C urdie's M ission." In both cases the He thus is able to enter a "round green h ill" and to go mentor gives specific instructions which are not entirely through "a long passage," w ith "w alls and roof which were clear. Curdie is told to "set out for the court" which rough and arched like a grotto, and composed of a clear and "lies to the north" (PC, pp. 73, 7*0, but he is not told transparent rock, incrusted with sheeps-silver and spar, and exactly where to go nor what to do when he gets there. J ill various bright stones. At last he came to two wide and lof­ is told that she w ill be searching for the lo st prince, and ty folding-doors, which stood a-jar. He opened them, and she is told of four signs to look for on the way to him, on entered a large and spacious hall, whose richness and b ril­ a route that w ill require her to "journey out of Narnia to liance no tongue can te ll." This is the castle of the King the north," but she is not told exactly where the prince is of E lfland, an underground setting sim ilar to the palace nor what she should do when she finds him (SC, p. 29). hall which Curdie finds occupied by the goblin rulers and to the castle of the Queen of Underland to which J ill and Curdie is given a companion and servant, a grotesque Eustace are taken. "The furniture of the hall was suitable somewhat dog-like beast named Lina. As they depart from to its architecture; and at the farther end, under a splendid Narnia J ill and Eustace acquire as th eir companion another canopy, seated on a gorgeous sopha of velvet, silk , and gold

6 (cf. the silver chair), and "Kembing her yellow hair wi* a In th is essay Lewis undertakes to "try to see clearly silver kemb,' 'There was his sister burd E llen.'" He says w hat... different kinds of pleasure" a story might provide. he is hungry, though he was forbidden to eat there by Mer­ What Lewis appreciates most in what he calls "books which lin . "Burd Ellen looked w istfully and mournfully at him, are 'mere sto ries'" is something that might be labeled a t­ and shook her head, but said nothing." Like Prince R ilian, mosphere (a word he him self uses at tim es). Lewis' love of she is under a spell, and instead of warning him, she serves stories is based on their effects, and the main effect which him food. He remembers the prohibition in time though (as he derives from them, he in sists, is not excitem ent, which J ill and Eustace remember their final instruction), and re­ is available only on a first reading. The source of a fuses to eat. He then fights and defeats the King of E lf- story's proper effects is more than what an abstract of some land, who agrees to "restore" Ellen to him and to revive the of the action might suggest. "Jack the G iant-K iller is not, two other brothers, who are there but "in a trance." So in essence, simply the story of a clever hero surmounting the four of them leave th is underground realm safely, like danger. It is in essence the story of such a hero surmount­ the four victors over the Queen of Underland. ing danger from giants." For Lewis, what can especially contribute to the particular effect of good stories is the In w riting his children's book Lewis was deliberately "idea of otherness.... Good stories often introduce the mar­ echoing folk fairy tales like "Child Rowland," may be even vellous or supernatural.A "16 good story, then, creates an drawing upon that particular story.10 (He is also basing effect, an atmosphere, a mood; and the fairy tale, which is him self upon folklore when, for example, he makes the time imbued with the m arvellous or supernatural, is one of the in his fairyland of Narnia move at a very different rate models of a good story. As MacDonald asserted, it is espec­ than it moves in the ordinary w orld.11) In so doing, Lewis ially capable of creating effects. If only a very few was follow ing the example of MacDonald and other nineteenth- people (including MacDonald) have the genius to create what century w riters—the German Romantics, the Dane Hans C hris­ Lewis regards as new myths, others can s till w rite stories tian Andersen, and in England Ruskin, Thackeray, Dinah which w ill produce effects sim ilar to those produced by Maria Mulock, Jean Ingelow, Oscar W ilde, Andrew Lang, and myths; for one thing, they too can w rite fairy tales. others—who drew upon traditional folk fairy tales and created a new form, the literary fairy tale, distinguished Furthermore, one particular effect of fairy tales is of from its prototype by m atters such as self-consciousness of the utmost value to the Romantic, religious Lewis; according form and style, greater sophistication, and often an obvi­ to him fairy tales can evoke a feeling of longing, of ous purposefulness. MacDonald played a major part in the Sehnsucht. for some other world. Like many of his Romantic development of th is sub-genre in England, producing a num­ predecessors over the preceding hundred and fifty years, ber of literary fairy tales in the form of stories and Lewis defends fairy tales as proper reading for a child books, some of them ostensibly for children but a ll of them (even w hile, like MacDonald and many other w riters of lite r­ available to adults. ("I do not write for children, but ary fairy tales, he denies that the tales, including those for the childlike, whether of five, or fifty , or seventy- he him self wrote, are meant only for children17). He pro­ five," he said.12) His serious, symbolic works were usu­ claim s: "Fairy land arouses a longing for he knows not ally more in the line of the German Romantics than in that what. It stirs and troubles him (to his life-long enrich­ of the w itty, courtly eighteenth-century French sophisti­ ment) with the dim sense of something beyond his reach and, cates who were the main models for Thackeray and his fo l­ far from dulling or emptying the actual world, gives it a low ers, and Lewis placed him self in the MacDonald school.13 new dimension of depth."18 Lewis him self experienced MacDonald's so-called children's books, like his fantasies effects like those which he and MacDonald attrib u te £o fairy for adults, include among th eir purposes the rendering of tales when he firs t read MacDonald's Phan tastes on a memor­ evocative effects; it is this characteristic of them that able day in 1916 and his "im agination was, in a certain gives them the qualities which Lewis considers the most sense, baptised." 19 By 1996 Lewis would say that "the true im portant aspects of "myth" and "story." name o f the quality which firs t met me in (M acDonald's) books is H oliness,"20 and Lewis him self was then about to In an essay on the fairy tale, which he sees as a undertake to render a sim ilar holiness through his own product of the im agination, MacDonald asserts that such a children's fairy tales, and to use a sim ilar means to do so. tale is im portant and has meaning. "Everyone, however, who In the Princess books and in the Chronicles of Narnia holi- feels the story, w ill read its meaning after his own nature and developm ent," he adds; and he goes on to make the fo l­ lowing other points. "The true fairytale is, to my mind, very like the sonata," and the words in it, like the notes in a sonata, can have it as their primary purpose not to convey an exact meaning but to "im press." "A fairy tale, a sonata, a gathering storm, a lim itless night, seizes you and sweeps you aw ay.... The best thing you can do for your fe l­ low, next to rousing his conscience, is—not to give him things to think about, but to wake things up that are in him; or say, to make him think things for him self." "Nature is mood-engendering, thought-provoking: such ought the sonata, such ought the fairytale to be. "14

In the Preface to his anthology of passages from Mac­ Donald's religious w ritings, Lewis, talking about the facul­ ty he calls the genius for creating myths, follow s MacDonald by making an analogy to music and by dw elling on the way,- in literature, this faculty has the ability to create effects, to render im pressions, to stim ulate new moods and thoughts. The genius, he says, "is in some ways more akin to music than to poetry—or at least to most poetry. It goes beyond the expression of things we have already fe lt. It arouses in us sensations we have never had before, never, anticipated having, as though we had broken out of our normal mode of consciousness and 'possessed joys not promised to our b irth ’. It gets under our skin, hits us at a level deeper than our thoughts or even our passions, troubles oldest certainties till a ll questions are re-opened, and in general shocks us more fu lly awake than we are for most of our lives. "15 The power to achieve such effects is the main value of a ll good "stories" for Lewis, as becomes clear in an essay "On Stories" which was first published the year after his edi­ tion of MacDonald appeared and three years before the firs t From More English Fairy T ales, ed. Joseph Jacobs. London: Narnian book came out. David N utt, 1899.

7 ness is introduced above a ll through the supernatural men­ 102). She m agically cleans Irene's dress, and at a later to rs, through the great-great-grandm other (who provokes in time cleans the g irl herself in an unreal bath. She produces the heart of the Princess Irene "a great longing" to see her a thread with which Irene finds Curdie in the mountains so again after she has seen her once—PG, p. 80), and through that she can save him, and subsequently Irene herself is Aslan the lion. saved from the goblins and found by Curdie thanks to the t h r e a d . These figures derive from the supernatural good fairy and the animal helper of fairy tales. The great-great-grand­ In The Princess and Curdie the old lady is frequently mother perhaps derives in part from a special form of the called a "princess" herself, and although the young Princess good fairy, the fairy godmother of courtly French fairy Irene also appears in the book later, it seems to be not she tales; but MacDonald never calls her a godmother and she has but her grandmother who is referred to by its title . As we significant differences from the common representations of have already noted, in this book it is Curdie who v isits the the type (for example, she serves not ju st the princess but old princess in her rooms, because he feels guilty about others too, such as Curdie, his mother, and the king). She having shot one of her pigeons. He goes up, hears the spin­ firs t appears when the young princess gets lost in the upper ning wheel, enters, and discovers "a sm all withered creature, stories of the castle. Standing at the top of the stairw ay, so old that no age would have seemed too great to w rite the princess hears "a curious humming sound.... It was more under her picture, seated on a stool beyond the spinning like the hum of a very happy bee that had found a rich well w heel.... She sat crumpled together, a film y thing that it of honey in some globular flow er, than anything else I can seemed a puff would blow away, more like the body of a fly think of at th is moment" (PG, p. 18), When she opens the the big spider (to which he had likened the wheel) had door from which th is sound comes, Irene sees "a very old sucked empty and le ft hanging in his web, than anything lady who sat spinning" (PG, p. 19; it is a scene which can else I can think of" (PC, pp. 2?-28). Later in the inter­ remind us of a crucial moment in "B riar Rose," though the view she changes and becomes young. "Every trace of the women and the subsequent actions are far different). This decrepitude and w itheredness she showed as she hovered like old lady, who can be seen only by people who believe in her, a film about her wheel, had vanished. Her hair was very is even older than she looks, and she changes her appearance w hite, but it hung about her head in great plenty, and shone frequently in the course of this and the follow ing book. A like silver in the moonlight. Straight as a p illar she stood d istin ct sense of holiness is rendered by MacDonald's des­ before the astonished boy, and the wounded bird had now criptions of her, her actions, and her surroundings. There spread out both its wings across her bosom, like some great are three doorways at the top of the stairs where she is m ystical ornament of frosted silver" (PC, pp. 33-34). It found. One of them leads to the room, illum inated by moon­ is indeed a spiritual image. lig h t, where she spins. One gives access to the rooftop, where she keeps pigeons. And the third leads to her magnif­ She is next seen by both Curdie and his father, in the icent bedroom, w ith a special lamp, where she sometimes has mines, where she herself gives off lig h t. a "fire" of roses. She is often adorned by beautiful gems, and she is constantly associated with sounds, sm ells, and Curdie and his father beheld a lady, beautiful sights of Nature. She appears in an ambience of peace; she exceedingly, dressed in something pale green, projects an aura of calm, of beauty, of protective love, of like velvet, over which her hair fell in catar­ control. Here is how she looks when Irene, guided by the acts of a rich golden colour. It looked as if old lady's magic lamp, comes to see her another tim e. "Her it were pouring down from her head, and, like grandmother was dressed in the loveliest pale blue velvet, the water of the Dustbrook, vanishing in a golden over which her hair, no longer white, but of a rich golden vapour ere it reached the floor. It came flowing colour, streamed like a cataract, here falling in dull from under the edge of a coronet of gold, set gathered heaps, there rushing away in smooth shining fa lls. with alternated pearls and emeralds. In front of And ever as she looked, the hair seemed pouring down from the crown was a great em erald, which looked some­ her head and vanishing in a golden m ist ere it reached the how as if out of it had come the light they had floor. It flowed from under the edge of a circle of shining follow ed. There was no ornament else about her, silver, set with alternated pearls and opals. On her dress except on her slippers, which were one mass of was no ornament whatever, neither was there a ring on her gleaming em eralds, of various shades of green, hand, or a necklace or carcanet about her neck. But her a ll mingling lovelily like the waving of grass slippers glimmered w ith the lig h t of the Milky Way, for they in the wind and sun. were covered with seed-pearls and opals in one mass. Her face was that of a woman of three-and-tw enty" (PG, pp. 101- ... All the beauty of the cavern, yes, of a ll

8 (Curdle) knew of the whole creation, seemed he looked sad as well" (LWW, p. 118). Like the ancient gathered in one centre of harmony and loveliness princess, Aslan the talking lion is a special, unreal fig­ in the person of the ancient lady who stood be­ ure, with a numinous quality. He too has magic powers which fore him in the very summer of beauty and he uses for good ends. He too is strong but also gentle, strength. (PC, pp. 48-49) able to destroy and able to pity and comfort , 21 r e g a l , beautiful, and emanating a special force. Before sending Curdle on his mission the older princess passes his hands through burning roses and thus endows him MacDonald and Lewis use somewhat sim ilar techniques to with a magical power, the ab ility to identify a person's introduce these two characters. For one thing, both of them true nature by holding his hand. Curdle does not knowingly address their readers directly, guiding them in their reac­ encounter her again until much later, when, in a dream -like tions. When the young princess opens the m ysterious door, vision of a "glorious terrible sight," he sees her, using MacDonald's text reads: "What do you think she saw? A very more burning roses and her own tears to bring the king back old lady who sat spinning. Perhaps you w ill wonder how the to health (or even, as it seems, back to life from death). princess could te ll that the old lady was an old lad y .... "Her golden hair went stream ing out from her through the The princess, though she could not have told you why, did air till it went off in mist and light. She was large and think her very old indeed—quite fifty , she said to herself. strong as a Titaness. She stooped over the table-altar, put But she was rather older than that, as you shall hear” (PG, her mighty arms under the living sacrifice, lifted the king, p. 19). Lewis brings Aslan on the scene by w riting: "None as if he were but a little child, to her bosom, walked with of the children knew who Aslan was any more than you do; but him up the floor, and laid him in his bed. Then darkness the moment the Beaver had spoken these words everyone fe lt fe ll. The miner boy turned silent away, and laid him self quite d ifferen t," and he goes on to communicate the way they down again in the corridor. An absolute joy filled his fe lt by referring to the way that "you"- might respond to a heart, his bosom, his head, his whole body. A ll was safe; certain kind of dream (LWW, p. 65 ). Furthermore, both a ll was w ell. With the helve of his mattock tight in his w riters render the effects produced by these figures by grasp, he sank into a dream less sleep" (PC, pp. 201-203). describing the reactions of the children who are seeing The princess subsequently appears in the form of a housemaid them—im pressionable, surprised children with whom the and uses her powers to control her pigeons and determ ine the readers of the books can identify them selves. The young outcome of the book's last battle; she then transform s her­ princess "stared bewildered" the firs t time she saw the old self to appear in one of her most m agnificent forms. "She one (PG, p. 19), and first time that Curdie saw her he stood went from the room, and in a moment returned in royal purple, "a good deal in wonder, a very little in reverence, a little with a crown of diamonds and rubies, from under which her in doubt, and, I must add, a little in amusement at the odd hair went flowing to the floor, a ll about her ruby-slippered look of the old m arvel." He laughed at her until "the little feet. Her face was radiant with joy, the joy overshadowed lady leaned forward into the m oonlight, and Curdie caught a by a faint m ist as of unfulfilm ent.... Then in ruby crown and glimpse of her eyes, and a ll the laugh went out of him" (PC, royal purple she served them all" (PC, pp. 216-217). These, p. 28). We have already seen how Lewis, in a sim ilar way, then, are the sorts of passages which MacDonald presents to renders Aslan by describing the effects he has on those who render the holiness that Lewis could feel in reading him. hear his name (and react strongly, as to a powerful dream), see him (and go "all trem bly"—Lewis here even uses the Lewis him self achieves comparable effects through his language of the children who are reacting and those who are presentation of Aslan. The importance of the lion is being addressed), or hear him (and, more slang, have the implied as early as the first words of the title of the "fidgets" taken out of them). firs t Chronicle of Narnia, The Lion, the W itch, and the Wardrobe. He is firs t mentioned by name in the follow ing In fact, Lewis seems to rely on th is technique much more way. The beaver speaks. than MacDonald does, to depend more upon descriptions of reactions to Aslan as a means of rendering him, whereas Mac­ 'They say Aslan is on the move—perhaps has a l­ Donald tends more to offer descriptions of the princess her­ ready landed.' self. And when Lewis does describe Aslan directly, he re­ veals another difference of technique from MacDonald's. And now a very curious thing happened. None of Over and over again MacDonald renders the older princess by the children knew who Aslan was any more than using images derived from outdoor Nature. (Her spinning you do; but the moment the Beaver had spoken these sounds "like the hum of a very happy bee"; she looks like words everyone fe lt quite different. Perhaps it "the body of a fly"; her hair "streamed like a cataract" has sometimes happened to you in a dream that and "shone like silver in the m oonlight"; the emeralds on someone says something which you don't understand her slippers mingled "like the waving of grass in the wind but in the dream it feels as if it had some enor­ and sun"; and so on.) Lewis, on the other hand, is more mous meaning—either a terrify in g one which), turns inclined to compare Aslan to objects in the modern everyday the whole dream into a nightmare or else a lovely world. (For instance, he likens his blowing out to the way meaning too lovely to put into words, which makes "a vacuum cleaner sucks in," and he says that he "lay ... the dream so beautiful that you remember it a ll like the lions in Trafalgar Square" (SC, pp. 23, 25)). It is your life and are always wishing you could get of course a fact that Lewis wrote his books over seventy into that dream again. It was like that now. At years after MacDonald had w ritten his; but it s till can be the name of Aslan each one of the children fe lt said that he is making a greater effort to make his holy s o m e th in g ju m p i n i t s i n s i d e . (LWW, p . 6 5 ) figure accessible to a contemporary urban child. Aslan is subsequently discussed and more and more an tici­ And MacDonald and Lewis can be contrasted w ith one pated, until he at last makes his appearance to defeat the another in m atters besides technique. As sim ilar as the two villain of this book and save Narnia. Here is how he first central figures are, they also are different from one appears, and how Lewis trie s to render a sense of holiness another in significant ways. through him. "Aslan stood in the centre of a crowd of creatu res.... People who have not been in Narnia sometimes F irst of a ll, the princess is a person and Aslan is an think that a thing cannot be good and terrib le at the same anim al. This difference tends to make the la tter figure more tim e. If the children had ever thought so, they were cured strange, more alien. The children who meet him are more un­ of it now. For when they tried to look at A slan's face they certain of how he w ill behave and (especially because of the ju st caught a glimpse of the golden mane and the great, kind of animal which he is) they are in part afraid of him, royal, solemn, overwhelming eyes; and then they found they and his difference from them and from the reader also con­ couldn't look at him and went a ll trembly" (LWW, pp. 115- tributes to the sense of holiness which he radiates. On the 11?). When Aslan firs t speaks, "his voice was deep and rich other hand, although the princess is a person she has and somehow took the fidgets out of them. They now fe lt another kind of advantage in rendering a sense of holiness, glad and quiet and it d id n 't seem awkward to them to stand for in the Princess books she is the source of a ll super­ and say nothing" (LWW, p. 117). Aslan is told how one of natural powers. She either uses them herself (sometimes the children has joined the witch, their enemy. "Up to that through anim als) or passes them on to others (to the young moment Lucy had been thinking how royal and strong and peace­ princess in the firs t book and to Curdie in the second one). ful his face looked; now it suddenly came into her head that Despite their grotesqueness, the goblins in the first book

9 you know who is the King of Beasts? Aslan is a lion—the Lion, the great Lion.' (LWW, pp. 74 - 7 5 )

The point is that Aslan is not only the helper in a fairy tale. He also stands for something else, and it is some­ thing specific: he stands for C hrist, so he is manly; he is C hrist incarnated into the form of one of the kinds of creatures into whose world he has entered, so he is an ani­ mal. Lewis' books about Aslan thus are, in part at least, allegorical.

According to Lewis, "what (MacDonald) does best is fantasy—fantasy that hovers between the allegorical and the mythopoeic."23 The "hovering" is im portant, because while there often is a suggestion of m ultiple meanings in MacDon­ ald, there usually is no clear, stric t, and extended one-to- one allegory in his fairy tales, especially in the Princess books. Thus, for example, G. K. Chesterton says that as he grew older than he was when he firs t read The Princess and the Goblin he "came to give a more definite name to the lady watching over us from the tu rret," but his interpretative response should be seen as only a personal one.24 Robert are, according to a legend referred to in the book, ju st the W olff and Tony Tanner have seen elem ents of an allegorical descendants of people who began to live underground and representation of man's psychological make-up in the castle evolved into strange creatures (becoming hard-headed and which has an upstairs inhabited by the princess and is toeless, for instance), and the evil people in the second undermined by the goblins' underground caverns.25 But book, whatever anim al natures they may hold w ithin them, though there is something suggestive about that reading, are, on the outside, only evil people, using ordinary poison neither of th eir specific analyses holds up under examina­ as their weapons there are no spell-binding witches like the tion, as C. N. Manlove has effectively shown. In Manlove's villains in Lewis' books (which also contain other talking opinion, "it is perhaps im possible to extract a connected animals in addition to Aslan and other supernatural beings meaning or 'allegory' from" what he, considers to be "the as w ell). MacDonald did portray supernatural villains in best of MacDonald's 'fairy ' w riting," which for him in­ other works, but he chose not to include any in these books cludes The Princess and the Goblin but not The Princess and and le ft the old princess the sole source of the magic in Curdle. "They are fu ll of hints, but once one tries to th e m . capture these, the story either escapes or fades." Manlove m aintains that in The Princess and the Goblin "one or two" For another thing, the princess, in a ll of her forms, of the symbols "have an arranged significance..., but in the is a woman, and Aslan is em inently m asculine. These obser­ main they are le ft m ysterious," and he illu strates that by vations can invite psychoanalytical conjecture, MacDonald, discussing such objects as the princess's pigeons (which it can be speculated, may have been compensating for the "could be symbols of the Holy G host"), the thread spun by fact that his mother died when he was eight years old; the the princess (which "signifies faith "), and other, "more princess can be seen as a replacem ent which his psyche pro­ obscure," symbols, such as her lamp, which can be in ter­ vided him w ith. Sim ilarly, Lewis (who fe lt that MacDonald preted in two different ways, neither of which is entirely had "an almost perfect relationship with his father"22) may satisfactory, and her magic ointm ent,and fiery rose, which ' have been compensating for the fact that he him self lacked a "resist interpretation" altogether.26 satisfactory father. But there are problems with this kind of speculation. Coincidentally, Lewis also lost his mother However, according to Manlove, some of the symbols in at a very early age, when he was nine years old, but he was The Princess and Curdie do have a more definite meaning. not provided w ith an adequate mother substitute, as Mac­ There, for example, "the flam ing roses become, as the heal­ Donald was. It is possible that one of the reasons why Mac­ ing fire in which the sick king is la id ..., a symbol of D onald's books appealed to Lewis so much was that they sacrifice or of C hrist's redemptive blood." As Manlove showed him a wonderful, protecting m aternal figure; but the points out, in th is book, "the symbolism of spinning-w heels, question arises why he did not use his own fairy tales to rose-fires, doves and buildings is more laboured... than in attem pt to compensate for his more absolute loss. The The Princess and the Goblin. "Y et," he continues, "even The theory of compensation thus fa ils to provide a certain ex­ Princess and Curdie has areas which are not covered by any planation of the fact that MacDonald's helper is feminine explicit or obvious meaning";27 and indeed, M anlove's main while Lewis' is masculine. But the difference exists, and argument about the explicitness of the later book has to do it does give a different quality to the two holy figures. with the way it so obviously presents its moral messages, not the way it is allegorical in technique. It may seem As far as Aslan is concerned, another kind of reason less spontaneous than the earlier book, but it too uses its can be advanced to suggest not only why he is masculine but also why is he a talking anim al; and this reason can lead us symbols essentially for their evocative effects, not as allegorical vehicles for the statem ent of precise meanings. into a discussion of other differences between Lewis and MacDonald him self said that "a fairytale is not an allegory. MacDonald. The basis for the reason can be found in a pas­ There may be allegory in it, but it is not an allegory."28 sage like the follow ing one, in which Aslan is being des­ If some of his own fairy tales are vaguely allegorical at cribed to the children in The Lion, the W itch, and the tim es, those of his disciple are decidedly more so. W a r d r o b e .

'T ell us about Aslan." said several voices at once; Thus, in several of the Narnian books not only is Aslan for once again that strange feeling—like the first described in term s which identify him with C hrist, but he signs of spring, like good news, had come over them. also takes part in actions like those which were experienced by C hrist in the Gospels. In The Lion, the W itch, and the 'Who is A slan?' asked Susan. Wardrobe. for example, Aslan reenacts some aspects of the 'Aslan?' said Mr. Beaver. 'Why, don't you know? crucifixion, dying for Edmund's sin to give Edmund life , and He's the King. H e's the Lord of the whole wood, then he returns to life in a version of the resurrection but not often here, you understand. Never in my (because he is the agent not ju st of fairy-tale magic but of tim e or my fa th e r's tim e .'... "Deeper Magic from before the Dawn of Time," as the title of Chapter 15 em phasizes). There is even a sort of "Harrowing o f H e l l."29 MacDonald's works certainly imply a C hristian attitude, especially toward death as the goal of life (some­ 'Is —is he a man?’ asked Lucy. thing which is strongly expressed in, for example, "The 'Aslan a man!' said Mr. Beaver sternly. 'C ertainly Golden Key" and At the Back of the North Wind), but he does not. I te ll you he is the King of the wood and not usually become this explicit in allegorizing Christian the son of the great Emperor-beyond-the-sea. Don't myth in his fairy tales. And when he does become allegori­

10 cal in this way—as he does in "The Light Princess," where a him when they were in Narnia. Indeed, the children's story saviour comes and is w illing to sacrifice him self to save a is greatly about their learning to obey and gaining faith in princess and her community—the parallels are not as obvious him, making them Everyman figures who learn and exem plify as they are in Lewis' works. (W hat's more, that particular how to qualify for eternal residence on A slan's mountain. story has a light tone which discourages the reader from Though, as we have seen, it is common for mentor figures in considering these interpretative p o ssib ilities.30) Prece­ fairy tales to give obscure instructions to people going on dence for something like Lewis' kind of explicit C hristian quests, Aslan gives his instructions not only to help the allegorizing in a fairy tale can be found not as much in children fu lfill their mission but also to lead them to be­ MacDonald's stories as in such other works as Andersen's come obedient and have faith in him. A fter he has given J ill "The Snow Queen," C hristina R ossetti's "Goblin M arket," and (whom he here addresses as '"daughter of Eve"'; SC, p. 31) perhaps above a ll, Oscar W ilde's "The Selfish G iant."31 her instructions he says: "'Remember, remember, remember the signs. Say them to yourself when you wake in the morn­ Lewis him self preferred to deny the term allegory to ing and when you lie down at night, and when you wake in the what he was doing, and most of the commentators on his middle of the night. And whatever strange things may happen works have also chosen to avoid it. According to Lewis, to you, let nothing turn your mind from follow ing the signs'" "The Narnian books are not as much allegory as supposal. (SC, p. 30). Lewis has Aslan, who is giving J ill instruc­ 'Suppose there were a Narnian world and it, like ours, tions how to follow his "'command'" (SC, p. 29), use the needed redemption. What kind of incarnation and Passion same language as that which Moses used for tellin g the might C hrist be supposed to undergo there?'" 32 But whatever Children of Israel to remember God's commandments, which had his intention was, an informed reader cannot help responding also been delivered on a mountain.35 And then Aslan warns to the story of Aslan as a parallel to the story of C hrist J ill that there is thicker air in Narnia. "'Take great care and thus seeing the former figure as an allegorical type of that it does not confuse your mind. And the signs which you the latter one. This does not prevent such a reader from have learned here w ill not look at a ll as you expect them to also responding to the story of Aslan in its own right, and look, when you meet them there. That is why it is so impor­ thus the books are not the kinds of naive allegories that tant to know them by heart and pay no attention to appear­ Romantics and moderns denigrate. But they are s till d if­ ances. Remember the signs and believe the signs. Nothing ferent from MacDonald’s works, which are more lim ited to else m atters'" (SC, pp. 30-3l). Aslan thus is not entirely suggestiveness. Lewis' books provide a different kind of like M erlin in "Child Rowland," who te lls the hero what to experience from MacDonald's for those readers who can note do so that that hero can accomplish what he already wants to the. parallels and thus solve the allegories, and they thus (namely, to find his sister). Actually Aslan was calling are also more definite in their C hristian didactic purposes. the children to him even when they thought they themselves were initiating their trip into Narnia; he is sending Jill Lewis denies that he had begun w riting the Narnian as his servant on a m ission which he wants taken care of, books as means of teaching C hristianity, saying that they and he expects obedience. had th eir origins in certain "images" which had come into Despite the warning, J ill and Eustace have much trouble his mind. But, he adm its, the C hristianity then entered, with the instructions, which he deliberately made d ifficu lt and was honored. "At first there w asn't even anything (else why, for example, did he not ju st say that Eustace C hristian about them; that element pushed itse lf in of its should greet the king he sees when he arrives?). Because of own accord," he says. He began as an "Author" who was the way that time passes much more quickly in Narnia than it w riting a fairy tale. ”Then_of course the Man in me began does in our world, Eustace is unable to recognize and so to to have his turn. I thought i saw how stories of this kind greet his "old and dear friend" (SC, p. 29). Then later, be­ could steal past a certain inhibition which had paralysed much of my own religion in childhood. Why did one find it cause of the discom forts of travel and a storm and because it is so ruined, the children fail to recognize "the ruined so hard to feel as one was told one ought to feel about God city of the ancient giants" (SC, p. 29), and instead go on or about the sufferings of C hrist?... But supposing that by to the apparent com forts of Harfang which the evil queen has casting a ll these things into an imaginary world, stripping them of their stained-glass and Sunday school associations, told them about. By then, as J ill admits to Aslan in a dream, she has forgotten a ll the signs. But in the dream he one could make them for the first time appear in their real potency?" So although many of his child readers, unaware of takes her to a window, whence she sees the words in the r u i n e d c i t y w h ic h t h e y w e re s u p p o s e d t o f i n d : "UNDER ME" the allegory, might not realize it, the holiness which Lewis (SC, pp. 103-109). And the next day she and the others read wished to render through his stories is a specifically that, escape, and, running away from the giants, find them­ C hristian holiness; the "longing" he wished to stim ulate is selves going where the w riting tells them to as they fa ll for the C hristian heaven.33 down a hole.

Lewis' position comes through particularly strongly at By now the children know from th eir own experiences the end of The Silver Chair. when Aslan appears for the ju st how d ifficu lt it can be to follow A slan's instructions, first time since he sent J ill on her m ission. He comes to so they w ill be extra careful. They have learned something bring the children home, and to do that he firs t blows them about how d ifficu lt it can be to be obedient, and how impor­ back up to "the Mountain of Aslan, high up above and beyond tant. The last instruction gives them their greatest test the end of the world in which Narnia lies" (SC, p. 201). and provides fin al proof of the validity of A slan's command­ There they find King Caspian, whose death in Narnia they had ments. They were told that the lost prince "w ill be the ju st w itnessed. The children and Aslan weep, but then Aslan firs t person you have met in your travels who w ill ask you sends Eustace for a thorn which he is told to drive into A slan's paw, and when A slan's blood is dripped on King Cas­ pian he is reborn a young man. This "image of salvation" (to use Clyde K ilby's term) is far less equivocal than Mac­ Donald's portrayal of the princess's reviving the king with burning roses and her own tears. Lewis' sacrificial symbol­ ism is more definitely C hristian, and the rebirth which he presents is not a figurative one on earth but an actual one in heaven.34 "'B ut,' said Eustace, looking at Aslan. 'H asn't he—er—died?' 'Y es,' said the Lion in a very quiet v o ice.... 'He has died. Most people have, you know. Even I have. There are very few who haven't'" (SC, p. 203). Caspian then assumes that the children are there under the same circum stances as he is, and "a great hope rose in the children's hearts. But Aslan shook his shaggy head. 'No, my dears,' he said. 'When you meet me here again, you w ill have come to stay. But not now. You must go back to your own world for a while" (SC, pp. 203-209).

In their own world the children presumably are to main­ tain the kind of faith in Aslan which they learned to have in

11 to do something in my name, in the name of A slan'" (SC, could also be seen as an instance of one of the secular p. 29). The person they meet who does that is the young virtues which MacDonald wanted to teach. (A fter a ll, accord­ knight who has just tied him self to the silver chair and ing to him "rousing his conscience" is the "best thing you told them not to release him under any circum stances. He can do for your fellow ."36) When the young Irene thinks of now says that they should free him and says so "by the great the lasting benefits which she has gained from contact with Lion, by Aslan him self" (SC, p. 144). What is to be done? her great-great-grandm other, she does not consider her en­ To whom should they be true? What if the'w itch put him up counters as having provided her with a taste of a heaven to it? "But then, supposing this was the real sign?...They that she now can look forward to going to. Instead, this is had muffed three already! they daren't muff the fourth." the kind of reaction she has, when she is bathing in the old And so, even though the resu lt might be fatal to them selves, lady's room and suddenly seems to be alone: they do untie R ilian, "In the name of Aslan" (SC, p. 145). Then their obedience is rewarded, and so the need to be Instead of being afraid, she fe lt more than happy— faith fu l to Aslan whatever the circum stances are is rein­ perfectly b lissfu l. And from somewhere came the f o r c e d . voice of the lady, singing a strange sweet song, of which she could distinguish every word; but of The children, discovered by the queen, who trie s to the sense she had only a feeling— no understand­ m aintain her power, then cheer Puddleglum when he responds ing. Nor could she remember a single line after to her claim that there is no Narnia and no Aslan by saying: it was gone. It vanished, like the poetry in a dream, as fast as it came. In after years, how­ 'Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, a ll ever, she would sometimes fancy th at snatches of those things—trees and grass and sun and moon melody suddenly rising in her brain must be little and stars and Aslan him self. Suppose we have. phrases and fragm ents of the air of that song; and Then all I can say is that, in that case, the the very fancy would make her happier, and abler made-up things seem a good deal more im portant to do her duty. (PG, p. 158) than the real ones. Suppose this black p it of a kingdom of yours is the only world. W ell, it The song which the old princess sings can be regarded as a strikes me as a pretty poor one. And th at's a metaphor for MacDonald's own fairy tales, and the young funny thing, when you come to think of it. princess responds to it as MacDonald said he wanted his W e're ju st babies making up a game, if you're readers to respond to his tales, with feeling, not under­ right. But four babies playing a game can make standing. W hat's more, the song has a lasting effect: it a play-world which licks your real world hollow. does not make the g irl long for heaven, but it does make her T hat's why I'm going to stand by the play-w orld. "happier, and abler to do her duty." MacDonald proves him­ I'm on A slan's side even if there isn 't any self to be a V ictorian Romantic and Irene sounds more like a Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a character from a Dickens novel than like one from a Narnian Narnian as I can even if there isn ’t any N arnia.' b o o k . (S C , p p . 1 5 6 - 1 5 7 ) Paradoxically, it is Lewis who goes to the extreme of The children have become follow ers of Aslan, and Lewis hopes worldly topical didacticism , when he uses The Silver Chair that his readers w ill also. The rhetorical effect of such a to vent his spleen against modern "experim ental" education. passage is to encourage a reader to join in the cheering and As Aslan and Caspian enter "our" world w ith J ill and Eustace to be ready to follow Aslan even when there does not seem to when they return from Narnia, to punish the bullies and be any proof that he exists. This is what Lewis wants be­ headm istress of the childrens' school, Lewis even seems to cause for him although Aslan the lion may not exist in our be violating his own strictures; he might well be accused of world, what he represents does. J ill and Eustace learn that encouraging youthful readers to hope for something like Aslan, whom they later confirm indeed is real, is to be divine intervention in dealing with school bullies and obeyed, believed in, and longed for; the reader is meant' to teachers them selves, that is, of stim ulating the wrong kind obey, believe in, and long for what Aslan represents. of "longing," as he him self attacks certain "school stories" for doing.37 Lewis' criticism of experim ental education is George MacDonald's characters, who also are "called" to one of the things that qualifies The Silver Chair for in­ serve, also learn and by example are meant to teach the vir­ clusion in F ifty Works in English* (*and American) L itera­ tues of belief and obedience. The young Irene, for example, ture We Could Do W ithout, whose authors say: "You cannot proves that she believes in her great-great-grandm other, and fake the ambiguous m orality of myths by simply w hispering Curdle in one book comes to share that belief and in the your own prejudices behind your hand."38 But The Silver other doubts then reaffirm s it and then, like J ill and Eus­ Chair is among some very good company in th eir book, and I tace, is sent on a m ission in which he has to follow incom­ think they exaggerate when they claim that the kinds of pas­ plete instructions. But the belief in the old princess and sages in question mar the entire book (let alone the entire in the beauties which surround her does not as clearly or s e r i e s ) . as exclusively represent belief in God; it also might repre­ sent belief in whatever object can be perceived only by the By having the children leave th is ordinary world for im agination, a faculty much prized by the Romantic MacDonald. Narnia and then return Lewis makes The Silver Chair d iffer­ The lamp, in th is regard, seems to represent some aspect of ent in s till another way from the Princess books, which, like the im agination as a means of perception. The old lady most of the traditional fairy tales collected by Perrault te lls the young princess that ’" if that light were to go out and the Brothers Grimm, are to tally set in a world where un­ you would fancy yourself lying in a bare garret, on a heap real things can happen. The Chronicles of Narnia here are of old straw, and would not see one of the pleasant things more sim ilar to other kinds of tales: to stories derived round about you a ll the tim e'" (PG, p. 8 5 ). Later she says from superstitions and legends about trip s into fairyland or that "'not everyone can see'" her lamp. "'How is it that I about the kidnapping of people by the fairies; to MacDonald's can, then?"' asks Irene. " 'It is a g ift born with you. And At the Back of the North Wind and his adult fairy -tale fan­ one day I hope everybody w ill have it'" (PG, p. 104). This tasies, Phantasies and L ilith , a ll of which portray movement seems to make more sense as a statem ent implying th at the between the ordinary world and another; to Alice in Wonder­ im aginative faculty is a g ift not yet received by (or acti­ land. which actually is not much of a fairy tale, and to vated in) a ll people than it does as a sim ilar statem ent books sim ilar to or derived from it which are more like fairy about the power of belief in God. And when it is said of tales, such as Mopsa the fairy ; and to the books of E. Nes- the Curdie who "was gradually changing into a commonplace b it which Lewis firs t read in childhood.39 in this kind of man" that "he believed less and less in things he had never book Lewis can present ordinary children w ith whom his read­ seen," the reference is not to him as an atheist but as an ers can identify themselves who make trip s into another unimaginative clod, insensitive to the attractions of such world for which they have longed (see,- e.g ., SC, p. 19), but Romantic sources of delight as "bees and b u tterflies, moths for Lewis this other world ultim ately foreshadows the supreme and dragonflies, the flow ers and the brooks and the clouds" other world, for which the fictional children w ill continue (PC, p. 1 7 ). to long, and that supreme other world is a world which Lewis' readers also can not only long for but also aspire to. Furthermore, obedience to the old princess is not The Silver Chair ends with a description of the underground necessarily put forth as a specifically religious virtue; it caves now used for recreation by the Narnians. "If ever you

12 have the luck to go to Narnia yourself, do not forget to ences. MacDonald, a child of Scotland, was closer to the have a look at those caves," concludes lew is, addressing his so il, while Lewis was the product of a more urban environ­ audience directly to try to stim ulate longing (SC, p. 206) . ment. MacDonald was more m ystical, Lewis more cerebral. And The Last B attle. the fin al Chronicle of Narnia, ends as MacDonald always had his fa ith , Lewis was him self a convert J ill, Eustace, children who appeared in other books, and to belief and so perhaps more anxious to try to directly in­ Narnians enter what is really meant to be longed for, fluence other conversions. MacDonald was a V ictorian who represented here by A slan's mountains. This time the chil­ seems to have been more preoccupied with the need to stim u­ dren w ill stay, for they are dead. "'The term is over,'" late a worldly sense of duty, perhaps because he was more in­ Asian tells them. "’The holidays have begun. The dream is clined to regard it as a foregone conclusion that a good ended: this is the m orning.'" They have entered Eternity. life w ill be rewarded with a happy afterlife, whereas Lewis "We can most truly say that they a ll lived happily ever was a citizen of the modern world of enlightened Godlessness after," remarks the narrator of The Last B attle (LB, p. 165) . and more possessed by a sense of the need to convince others The conventional phrase for ending a fairy tale is here that an afterlife awaits them. The lis t could be extended meant to have unconventional im plications. to help us understand why Lewis' works are different from MacDonald’s in the ways they are. Whatever the reasons for A more conventional ending does appear near the conclu­ the differences, Lewis wrote a series of books which resemble sion of The Princess and Curdie, when we are told that when ones by his chosen m aster but have th eir own virtues as Curdie and Irene grew up they got m arried. But in a way not w ell.' Inspired by MacDonald, Lewis took an old form and pro­ typical of fairy tales, there is then a projection into the duced in his century what MacDonald had developed in his, future which te lls us that they had no children, that the literary fairy tales with a sense of holiness. king who follow ed them was only greedy for gold and his people became wicked, and that because of that king's greed the supports for the city were reduced and "one day at noon, NOTES when life was at its highest, the whole city fe ll with a roaring crash" (PC, p. 221). The population was destroyed, and where the city once stood, there now "spreads a w ilder­ 1Preface to George MacDonald: An Anthology (London: ness of wild deer, and the very name of Gwyntstorm had Geoffrey Bles, 1946), p. 20. ceased from the lip s of men" (PC, p. 221). MacDonald, after a ll, shares Lewis's Christian belief that the only place 2Roger Lancelyn Green and W alter Hooper, C. S. Lewis: A where people might truly live happily ever after is in the Biography (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1974), p. 251. To lis t world to come, and he is reminding us that the action of his the c ritic s who have noted Lewis' debt to MacDonald would book is set not there but in a fallen world. N evertheless, alm ost be to w rite a bibliography of Lewis criticism . John the world in which this MacDonald story is set is not a world D. Haigh, who says that "it may be confidently stated that apart from ours, not fairyland. MacDonald does not portray the structure, religious symbolism and moral tone of Narnia trip s to other worlds in the Princess books. However much owe more to (MacDonald) than to any other author," has gone MacDonald him self might have longed for the other world which a b it further than most of the other critics in some speci­ was to be entered after the death that he looked forward to fic attributions of parts of The Silver Chair to MacDonald's throughout a ll .of his own long life , the Princess books and Phantastes and Princess books, but even he has only a little many of his stories, project a strong feeling that there are to say on the subject. ("The Fiction of C. S. Lewis," Un­ beauties and glories and even joy to be found in th is world published Ph.D. dissertation, U niversity of Leeds, 1962, t o o . 4 0 Like many other Romantics, MacDonald apparently be­ pp. 113, 252-254.) Also see the anonymous "The Myth Makers," lieved that life could be made a fairy tale if one believed TLS.' C hildren's Book Section. July 1, 1955. 1 -ii; and Mary that it could be and if one's im agination were capable of K irkpatrick, "An Introduction to the Curdie Books by George perceiving it that way, just as the old princess, whose MacDonald, Including P arallels between them and the Narnian beauty repeatedly is described as the beauty of Nature, is C hronicles," CSL: The B ulletin of the New York C. S. Lewis there to be seen in her beauty by those who believe in her Society. Vol. 5, No. 5 (March, 197*0, PP. 1-6. and can properly perceive her. MacDonald's books try to make us sim ilar to the young princess, who sees the old one at once but s till has to overcome some doubts, and sim ilar to 3Green and Hooper, Ch_ S^_ Lewis, p. 250. Curdie, who firs t has to learn to believe in her, then can see her. The "other" world which MacDonald shows us in 4Lewis, Preface to George MacDonald, p. 17. these books turns out to be "here," presumably to be much the way the ordinary world could be or can become, even for us. In contrast, Lewis offers his fairy-tale world of 5Ibid., pp. 15- 17. Narnia as a distinct other world. He might say that in this regard he seems to be more of a Romantic C hristian, for whom 6The Princess and the Goblin (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, not this world but only the next one can be like fairyland, 1964), p. 12. Subsequent page references w ill be placed in whereas MacDonald's Princess books seem to be more the work the text (after FG), as w ill be those to the other children's of a C hristian Romantic, of a man whose C hristian position books by MacDonald and Lewis. A ll of the quotations from m odifies his Romantic vision but does not color it totally. these books w ill be taken from the Puffin editions of them, firs t published by Penguin as follow s: MacDonald, The In sum, when C. S. Lewis, one of the major literary Princess and Curdie (PC) ( 1966); Lewis, The Lion, the W itch, critics of his generation, a significant lay apologist for and the Wardrobe (LWW) (1959), The Silver Chair (SC) (1965), C hristianity, and the author of three works of fantastic and The Last B attle (LB) ( 196*+). The Princess stories were fiction for adults, began to w rite books for children, he originally published in serial form in 1870-71 and 1877 drew upon many sources; but probably most im portant of a ll respectively! the Narnian books firs t came out annually from were works by the man whom he had already proclaim ed to be 1950 through 1956. his m aster, the V ictorian lecturer, preacher, and author George MacDonald. Of a ll of the Chronicles of Narnia, the one which seems to owe the most to MacDonald, is The S ilver 7Works by MacDonald in which heroes release enchanted Chair, which has particular likenesses to the two children's figures include "The Fairy Fleet" (which became part of "The books by MacDonald that are closest to the fairy-tale tradi­ Carasoyn"), "L ittle Daylight" (which firs t appeared in At tion, The Princess and the Goblin and The Princess and the Back of the North Wind), and Fhantastes and the in ter­ Curdie. In these works Lewis and MacDonald present sim ilar polated story about Cosmo in it. The battles near the ends characters who participate in sim ilar actions which take of both Princess books anticipate those which climax such place in sim ilar settings, and both of the w riters endow Narnian books as The Lion, the W itch, and the Wardrobe and th eir works with moral im plications and sp iritu al ambiences. The Last B attle. (And the "Vengeance" chapters of The Yet The Silver Chair also differs from the Princess books in Princess and Curdie call to mind a sim ilar scene in Lewis' several ways, lew is reveals him self to be more deliberate That Hideous Strength: A Modern Fairy-Tale for Grown-Ups.) than MacDonald in trying to appeal to the contemporary urban child, more w illing to use the technique of allegory, and 8James E. H iggins, "A L etter from C. S, Lewis, " The Horn more explicitly and em phatically C hristian in his meanings Book Magazine. 42 (1966), 53**. The le tte r is dated 2 Decem­ and purposes. One can suggest many reasons for the d iffer­ ber 1962. Cf. remarks in "On Three Ways of W riting for

13 Children" and "Sometimes Ihiry Stories May Say Best W hat's (London: C ollins, 1959), p. 146. Surprised by Joy was first To Be Said," both reprinted in C. S. Lewis, Of Other W orlds; published in 1955, Green and Hooper have corrected lew is’ Essays and S tories, ed. W alter Hooper (New York: Harcourt m isdating in it of his reading of Phantasies (C. S. Lewis, Brace, 1966), p p .23 and 36- 37 . p . 4 4 ) .

9The version of the tale which I am drawing upon is that 20C. S. Lewis, The G reat D ivorce: A Dream (London: presented by Robert Jamieson in Illu stratio n s of Northern Geoffrey Bles, 1946), p. 60. Cf. Lewis, Preface to George A ntiquities (Edinburgh: B allantyne, 1819), pp. 397-404. MacDonald, p. 14; and Surprised by Joy, p. 145. M otif numbers are from Thompson's M otif-Index (Bloomington: Indiana U. P ., 1955-58), v o l s . 6 21"The wonderful q u alities of A slan's mane and his embrace and warm breath remind one of the ecstatic peace which the 10Something else which the works have in common, and share princess always found in the arms of her fairy grandmother with many MacDonald works as w ell, is a sense of medieval w ith long golden hair in George MacDonald's The Princess and R o m a n c e . the Goblin." Kathryn A. Lindskoog, The Lion of Judah in Never-Never Land: The Theology of C. S. Lewis Expressed in Lewis' possible source for "Child Rowland," besides His Fantasies for Children (Grand Rapids, M ich.: Eerdmans, Jamieson, is the version of it (based on Jam ieson's and only slightly different) presented by Joseph Jacobs in English 1973). P- 68. Fairy Tales (first published 1890). In a discussion which proposes possible sources for various parts of The Silver 22Lewis, Preface to George MacDonald, p. 10. Chair ("Epistem ological Release in The Silver Chair." in The Longing for a Form: Essays on the Fiction of C. S. Lewis, ed. 23"And th is, in my opinion, he does better than any man." Peter J. Schakel (Kent, Ohio: Kent State U. P ., 1977), pp. Lewis, Preface to George MacDonald, p. 14. 159-168), John D. Cox cites a possible connection to M ilton's Comus. Interestingly enough, Jacobs, in his exten­ sive notes to "Child Rowland", cites parallels between that 24Introduction to G reville MacDonald, George MacDonald and work and Comus (New York: Dover, 1967, a rep rin t of the His Wife (London: A llen &. Unwin, 1924), p. 11. As Richard third edition of 1898, pp. 294-251). If Cox and Jacobs are H. Reis says, there is a lig h t in the princess's room "which both correct then Lewis may have been drawing upon "Child G. K. Chesterton chooses to regard as the lig h t of God, but Rowland" a t one remove even if he did not know the tale whose meaning MacDonald carefully refuses to delim it by itse lf—or on the other hand perhaps the reason his work defining it." George MacDonald (New York: Twayne, 1972), resem bles Comus is that they share "Child Rowland” as a p . 8 1 . common source. 25W olff, The Golden Key, p. 166; Tanner, "M ountains and 11See K atharine Briggs, "The Supernatural Passage of Time in Depths—An Approach to N ineteenth-Century D ualism ," Review Fairyland," The Vanishing People: Fairy Lore and Legends (New of English L iterature. Ill, iv (O ct., 1962), pp. 52-53- York: Pantheon, 1978), pp. 11-26. 26Manlove, Modern F antasy. pp. 83- 88 . In trying to answer 12"The Fantastic Im agination," in A Dish of Q rts: C hiefly the question of "who is" the old princess, Rodeniels M cGillis Papers on the Im agination, and on Shakespeare (London: asserts that she cannot be "explain(ed)... away," and he Sampson Low, 1893), P* 317- concludes that she is both dream and reality , nature and supernature. "'If you call me grandmother, that w ill do,"' 13MacDonald's literary debts to the Germans (especially to M ythlore, Vol. 6, No. 3 (Summer, 1979). pp. 27-28. Novalis and Hoffmann) have been treated most fu lly by Robert Lee W olff, in The Golden Key: A Study of the Fiction of 27Ibid., pp. 88 and 82. George MacDonald (New Haven: Yale U. P ., 196lji See also Glenn Edward Sadler, "The Fantastic Im agination in George MacDonald," in Im agination and the S p irit, ed. Charles A. 28MacDonald, "The F antastic Im agination," in A Dish of H uttar (Grand Rapids, M ich.: Eerdmans, 1971), esp. pp. 218- Orts . p. 317. 220. Sadler suggests that Lewis might be placed in a line moving from N ovalis through MacDonald, as does Joe R. 29The most extensive listin g of what the author calls Christopher (more tentatively) in "An Introduction to "C hristian analogy" (p. 9 ) in the Narnian Chronicles can be Narnia, Part III: The Genre of the C hronicles," M ythlore, found in Clyde S. Kilby, Images of Salvation in the Fiction Vol. 2, No. 4 (W inter, 1972), pp. 17-20. of C. S. Lewis (Wheaton, Illin o is: Harold Shaw, 1978). p p . 5 5 - 6 4 . 14MacDonald, The F antastic Im agination," in A Dish of Q rts. pp. 316-320. C. N. Manlove has pointed to contradic­ 30An anonymous 1894 review er objected to the "modern note tions in MacDonald's position, which advocates both a of burlesque th at is continually sounded throughout the chaotic and a controlled a rt, and to contradictions between story" and said that the tone of the story is inconsistent MacDonald's theory and practice. But if MacDonald was not w ith the claim s about fairy tales made by MacDonald in the consistent in his theoretical pronouncements, they come down preface to the volume of stories being reviewed (a preface heaviest on the side of evocative art; and Manlove him self which was later reprinted as "The Fantastic Im agination"). adm its th at M acDonald's works sometimes do operate as "Dr. George MacDonald's and Mr. Oscar W ilde’s Fairy-T ales," MacDonald said he wanted them to . Modern Fantasy: Five The Spectator. 72 (14 A pril 1894), 508. G reville MacDonald Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge U. P ., 1975), pp. 55"98. saw "The Light Princess" as a "jeu d 'esn rlt." George MacDonald and W ife, p. 324. 15Lewis, Preface to George MacDonald, pp. 16-17. Such MacDonald stories as "The G ifts of the Child C hrist" and "The C astle: A Parable" do present rather clear alle­ 16lew is, "On S tories," in Of Other W orlds. pp. 3-21. gories of salvation through C hrist—but neither of them is a literary fairy tale. 17See "On Three Ways of W riting for C hildren," in ib id ., pp. 24-28. In the dedication to The Lion, the W itch, and 31The Snow Queen" is a variation on the "Quest fo r lo st the Wardrobe Lewis says to his goddaughter: "Some day you prince" story which thus has a sim ilar plot to The Silver w ill be old enough to sta rt reading fairy tales again” Chair in addition to sharing an allegorical method used for (LWW, p . 5 ). Romantic C hristian purposes. It has been seen as "point (ing) toward the Chronicles of Narnia" by Joe R. Christopher 18Lewis, "On Three W ays," in Of Other W orlds, p. 29. ("An Introduction to N arnia," p. 18). Connections of the Narnian books with W ilde's fairy tales (which are briefly compared to MacDonald's in the 1894 review cited above) 19C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life could also be pursued.

1 4 can be taken as an instance of growth during life , not of re­ 32Higgins, "A le tte r from C. S. Lewis," 533. birth after death.

33Lewis, Sometimes Fairy S tories May Say Best W hat's To Be 35E.g ., in Deuteronomy 6 : 4-9, and 11: 18-19. Said," in Of Other W orlds, pp. 36- 37.

On the C hristian didactic purposes of the Narnian books 36MacDonald, "The Fantastic Im agination," in A Dish of Q rts. see W alter Hooper, "Ibst W atchful Dragons: The Fairy Tales p . 3 1 9 . of C. S. Lewis," in Im agination and the S p irit, ed. H uttar, e s p . p p . 3 2 5 - 3 3 2 ; and "Narnia: The Author, The C ritics, and 37Lewis, "On Three Ways of W riting for C hildren," in Of The Tale," C hildren's literatu re. Vol. 3 (Philadelphia: Other W orlds. p. 29. Temple U. P., 1974), pp. 12-22. On these purposes and the books' consequent difference from T olkien's The Lord of the Rings see Charles Moorman, "'Now E ntertain Conjectures of a 38Brigid Brophy, M ichael Levey, and C harles Osborne, j& ftv Time’—The Fictive Worlds of C. S. lew is and J. R. R. Works in English* (*and American) L iterature We Could Do Tolkien," in Shadows of Im agination: The Fantasies of C. S. W ithout (London: Rapp & C arroll, 1967) , p . 1 4 7 7 Lewis, Ri_ Ri Tolkien. and Charles W illiam s, ed. Mark R. H illegas (Carbondale: Southern Illin o is U. P ., 1969) , 39See Surprised by Joy, p. 17; and in a le tte r of 31 J u l y p p . 5 9 - 6 9 . 1962 Lewis says: "My knowledge of children's literatu re is really very lim ited .... My own range is about exhausted by In Tolkien's famous essay "On Fairy Stories" (first pub­ MacDonald, Tolkien, E. N esbit, and Kenneth Graham." L etters lished 199-7; reprinted in Tree and Leaf (London: Allen & of C. S. Lewis, ed. W. H. Lewis (London: Geoffrey Bles, Unwin, 1964)), he celebrated fairy tales for having happy 1966) , p . 3 0 4 . endings which he regarded as especially valuable for giving readers a sense of the happy ending which C hristianity says is to come, and he even called the Gospel itse lf a fairy 40"'You have tasted of death now,' said the Old Man. 'Is story. But he apparently did not care for the way that his it good?' 'It is good,' said Mossy. 'It is better than friend C. S. Lewis made his fairy tales into allegorical life .' 'N o,' said the Old Man: 'it is only more life .'" representations of parts of the Gospels and used them as George MacDonald, "The Golden Key," in The Light Princess vehicles for the statem ent of Christian positions. W alter and Other Tales (London: Gollancz, 1973), P- 238. Hooper says: "Professor Tolkien told me that he is not especially fond of (the Narnian books); he would have pre­ And cf. Chesterton: "George MacDonald did really believe ferred them to be more subtle. That is, he thinks the that people were princesses and goblins and good fairies, C hristianity in them too clear." "An Interview with W alter and he dressed them up as ordinary men and women." Intro­ Hooper, Appendix to Eliane Aymard, "C. S. Lew is's Narnian duction to G reville MacDonald, George MacDonald and Wife. Chronicles: Or, On the Other Side of the Wardrobe Door," P . 1 1 . Memoire presente pour l'obtention du Diplome d'Etudes Superieures d'A nglais, U niversite de Toulouse, 1967, p. 160. On the other hand, At the Back of the North Wind, Phantasies, and L ilith a ll present a fairyland which is apart from the "real" world, and they a ll imply that the 34"There is th is difference between the growth of some world to be entered after death is even better than that human beings and that of others," w rites MacDonald. "In the fairyland. If MacDonald is ambivalent in the m atter, one case it is a continuous dying, in the other a continuous Lewis is more consistent; certainly the Princess books and resurrection" (PC, p. 17). The king's "resurrection" thus the Narnian ones can be contrasted in th is regard. C.S. Kilby to Retire Society Elections 1981 Dr. Clyde S. Kilby, curator of the Marion E. Wade Col­ In accordance with changes in the Provisions of the lection at Wheaton College, w ill retire July 1, 1981. Kilby, C alifornia Non-Profit Corporation Code which went into effect who has served as curator for 15 years since his retirem ent in 1979, there shall be a B allot Election for the electable from teaching at the College, w ill become curator em eritus. offices of the Council of Stewards every three years. The next such election shall be in 1981, with the terms of office E ffective December 15 he has moved to an advisory role to begin on January 1, 1982. with Dr. Kriegbaum assuming adm inistrative responsibilities until a successor is named. A search committee, headed by Nominations to the Council of Stewards may be made by Dr. Peter Veltman, dean of the College, w ill identify a new a supporting petition of at least 33 of the current c u r a t o r . members or by action-of the Council of Stewards. Nominations shall be closed 120 days before the date of the election. Largely through K ilby's efforts the Wade C ollection, featuring the works of seven B ritish authors, has been built The qualifying nominees shall be announced in the Octo­ into an assemblage of world prominence. Wheaton holds the ber 1981 issues of Mvthlore and M ythprint. The deadline for most comprehensive collections of C. S. lew is, Owen B arfield, postmarked ballots shall be December 1, 1981. The deadline Dorothy L. Sayers, and Charles W illiams m aterials. Other for receipt of supporting petitions shall be July 8 , 1 9 8 1 , authors include G. K. C hesterton, George MacDonald and and shall be sent to the Society's Recording Secretary: J. R. R. Tolkien. George Colvin, 3500 Lou E lla Lane, R iverside, CA 92507.

The Wade C ollection began in 1965, when Kilby stepped The positions are: Recording Secretary, Corresponding down from 15 years as chairman of the English departm ent. He Secretary, Treasurer, Manager of the Orders Department, and the College librarian, Robert Coulter, initiated a speci­ M ember-at-Large, Editor of M ythlore. Editor of M ythprint. al accumulation of C. S. Lewis m aterials that was to grow Editor of M ythellanv. and Editor of Parma Eldalamberon. into the current collection used by scholars from around the w o r ld .

Kilby has edited or authored ten books, four of which You Can Help center on C. S. lew is, and has w ritten chapters or prefaces Your personal help can make a great difference by post­ for nine other books. In 1966 he spent the summer working ing xerox copies of the flyer for Mythlore in various places. with J. R. R. Tolkien in Oxford giving editorial help with The Flyer is on page 25 of the last issue. Besides posting The Silm arillion." In 1969 he was the Guest of Honor at Flyers, going to the periodical, serial, or acquisition the firs t Mythopoeic Conference at Claremont, C alifornia. department of the U niversity, College, or public library (with a copy of Mythlore in hand) and urging the proper party It would be appropriate to write letters of appreciation to subscribe, w ill be a great help. More libraries sub­ to him for a ll he has done. The address is Wheaton College, scribing w ill mean more exposure and individual subscrip­ Wheaton, Illin o is 60187. t i o n s .

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