The Visionary Woman in CS Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia
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Volume 6 Number 4 Article 7 10-15-1979 Guardaci Ben: The Visionary Woman in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia and That Hideous Strength Nancy-Lou Patterson Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore Part of the Children's and Young Adult Literature Commons Recommended Citation Patterson, Nancy-Lou (1979) "Guardaci Ben: The Visionary Woman in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia and That Hideous Strength," Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature: Vol. 6 : No. 4 , Article 7. Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/mythlore/vol6/iss4/7 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 Mythcon 52: The Mythic, the Fantastic, and the Alien Albuquerque, New Mexico; July 29 - August 1, 2022 http://www.mythsoc.org/mythcon/mythcon-52.htm Abstract Examines the characters of visionary women—what Esther Harding calls the femme inspiratrice—in Lewis’s fiction. Part one focuses on Jane in That Hideous Strength. Part two focuses on Lucy in the Chronicles of Narnia. Additional Keywords Lewis, C.S.—Characters—Lucy Pevensie; Lewis, C.S. Chronicles of Narnia; Seers, female; Thadara Ottobris 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/vol6/iss4/7 Guardaci Ben:The Visionary Woman InC.S. Lewis' Chronicles Of NarniaAnd That Hideous Strength Nancy-Lou Patterson Part Two Lucy Pevensie is the seeress of the Narnian Chronicles, ("She's just making up a story for fun") (Ibid.) the wardrobe as Jane Studdock is the seeress of That Hideous Strength. in terior. In The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, the first of the seven tales of Narnia, Lucy's first visit to Narnia begins Then everyone looked in and pulled the coats inside an old wardrobe, with a sensation of touch and sound: apart; and they all saw—Lucy herself saw—a per "she noticed that there was something crunching under her fectly ordinary wardrobe. [Ibid.) feet." 15 Then, "she felt ["with her hands"] something soft and powdery and extremely cold." And, "rubbing against Lucy's name means "light," and the light meant is her face and hands was . something hard and rough." that which is symbolised by the torches carried in the Vision begins when she is "a step or two" across the boundary Eleusinian mysteries, the light of inspiration or visionary between the worlds: "And then she saw that there was a experience. Lucy is called after a saint who made a sacri light ahead of her ..." (Ib id .) fice of the eyes her lover had adored, in order to dedicate herself wholly to Christ. St. Lucy's symbol is a pair of Looking back, she sees her own world: "It seemed to eyes, and her feast falls in December and is in fact associated be still daylight there." (p. 6) In the world inside the with the light symbolism of the Winter Solstice season, for wardrobe, Narnia, it is night, but there is a light there, in Sweden little girls or young women wearing a crown of a lamp-post. By its mysterious [and, we learn in The lighted candles represent the "Lucia Bride" or "Bride of Magician’s Nephew, organic) illumination, Lucy meets her Light." first Narnia, Tumnus the Faun. This masculine being functions as her guide, an animus figure, and leads her Lucy's first experience of Narnia is mediated through into the forest and to his cave, where he offers her tea, light. When Edmund, a few days later, stumbles into sardines, toast, honey and cake, and regales her with tales Narnia, he too "saw a light." (p. 21) But for him the light of Narnian life. "He had a strange, but pleasant little comes from "a pale blue sky" where the sun is "just rising, face with a short pointed beard and curly hair, and out of very red and clear." (p. 22) His eyes show him a different the hair there stuck two horns." We have already seen the being from the one encountered by Lucy: "There swept into beardedness of the animus figures for Lewis. The repast sight a sledge drawn by two reindeer." (p. 23) The image Lucy shares with Mr. Tumnus—"a wonderful tea"—in his is reiterated: "The sledge was a fine sight as it came sweeping cave, is reminiscent of the pomegranate, the fruit eaten toward Edmund." (p. 24) It bears the White Witch Jadis, by Persephone in Hades which confined her there for half a malignant anima or female guide for Edmund, and she a year in the perpetual round of Winter and Summer; it had sweeps him away on her sledge (she has a dwarf attendant), been plucked from a tree which "grew in the garden of the offering him her own sort of feast: "a jewelled cup of king of the underworld."16 This slight suggestion of the something that steamed" and "several pounds of underworld motif appears later in the series, as will be the best Turkish Delight . sweet and light to the very seen. The lamp-light in which Lucy's first encounter with centre." (Ibid) This food Lewis describes as frankly Narnia and the Narnians is bathed, is related to a symbolic addictive. Later on, Edmund meets Lucy in the wood, and system with an Eleusinian colouring—the Eleusinian mysteries after their return to England, Edmund denies his vision, celebrated the myth of Persephone. Robert A. Johnson to Lucy's great distress. w rites o f The next visit to Narnia takes all four children the light-bearing capacity of women. In the Eleusinian through the wardrobe door, and again, as Susan says, "It's mysteries, the women often carry torches, which shed getting lighter-over there." (p. 43) "All four children a peculiarly feminine kind of light. A torch softly stood blinking in the daylight of a winter day." (p. 44) lights up the immediate surroundings, shows the This time they find Tumnus' cave ransacked and a notice practical next step to be taken. (Johnson, Op. Cit., proclaiming the rule of "Jadis, Queen of Narnia." But p . 27) another guide discloses himself, to Lucy, first: "Lucy said, 'Look! There's a robin, with such a red breast. It's the In Lucy's return to England from Narnia, she runs first bird I've seen here.' " (p. 48) from lamp-post back to daylight, where she stands panting, "I'm here. I've come back." (Lewis, Op. Cit., p. 17) The The robin, of whom Lewis says, "You couldn't have returned visionary meets a doubting reception and is pro- found a robin with a redder breast or a brighter eye,' plays mounced "batty" by her brother Edmund and "silly" by her a role which is typical of that attributed to birds in folk sister Susan, (pp. 18, 19) To prove her point she shows lore. A similar figure is seen in a children's novel popular the doubters, along with her more tolerant brother Peter during Lewis' childhood. The Secret Garden, by Frances 20 Hodgson Burnett. In searching for a garden which has been appears at last, the children were speechless "when they closed for ten years, a little girl, Mary Lennox, "saw a saw him," and, abashed by his "overwhelming eyes," bird with a bright red breast sitting on the topmost branch they "couldn't look at him." Not surprisingly, then, the of one of [the trees of the garden.]"17 A few chapters later culminating vision of Aslan resurrected is expressed in the the robin shows her first the key and then the door to the same terms. garden which gives the book its name. The robins in Britain are brighter-breasted than the larger, somewhat This visionary pattern recurs in Prince Caspian: tum bled rusty-breasted robins of North America. from a railway platform into "such a woodsy place that branches were sticking into them" "They all rubbed their eyes," and Lucy's robin leads the Pevensies to their encounter Peter exclaims, "I can't see a yard in all these trees."18 with Mr. and Mrs. Beaver, and thus well into their Narnian Working out of the thicket, "Everything became much brighter," adventures. The spell o f endless winter which th e s e lf- and they are on the shores of the sea. The first chapter proclaimed Queen-witch has cast over Narnia is to be contains a series of sightings by Lucy—" 'Look!' said Lucy broken by the coming of Aslan, Narnia's true Lord. He is suddenly, 'What's that?' " and it proves to be a stream of preceded in his coming by another sledge-rider, Father fresh water. (Ibid, p . 6) Christmas, "a huge man in a bright red robe [bright as holly-berries)." (Lewis, Op. Cit., p. 86) Lewis remarks, "I say!" exclaimed Lucy, "I do believe that's "though you see people of his sort only in Narnia, you see an apple tree." pictures of them .