Pocket Companion to Narnia: A Guide to the Magical World of C.S. Lewis
By Paul F. Ford
4.5/5
()
About this ebook
The pocket guide is an adventurer's passport to the land of Narnia. From Aslan, the great lion, to Zardeenah, the mysterious lady of the night, this comprehensive and accessible companion contains hundreds of alphabetically arranged entries covering all the characters, events, places, and themes that Lewis magically wove into his timeless and magical world.
This little book will be perfect for the millions of kids and parents who already love the Narnia books and want to go deeper into that world, as well as for those newly drawn to the story by the Narnia movie. The Pocket Companion is a perfect gift book, a natural movie tie-in, and will continue to help readers and fans get closer to the magical world of Narnia for years to come.
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Reviews for Pocket Companion to Narnia
5 ratings5 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Only a 2.5 (below average) because there's not much in there that a true Narnian wouldn't know already...
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I first entered Narnia as a child, simply pushing the fur coats aside and stepping through the wardrobe into the snowy world near the lamp post. I didn't need a guide book. Things just unfolded and I went with the flow of wonders. I came back for an extended visit when I was expecting my first child. There were concepts there that I had not noticed before as "concepts". I felt inspired and doubly moved by its beauty. Now, I'm at the "grandma" age if not yet in that reality. I've popped back in to visit old friends and this guide book is truly a "companion." I realize that the word "companion" in the title refers to the fact that this volume is a companion to the Narnia books, but for me the title has a double meaning, in that it is also my companion on the journey to Narnia, my tour guide, so to speak.This book takes you by the hand and encourages you to look closer, gently pointing out the secrets of the locale that only the natives might know. It gives insights and provokes thought and dialogue. It is a neat holistic view that encourages an appreciation for the big picture by illuminating the subtle details. It is also the kind of tribute to the minute of one's heroes that all "fans" love to pour over. If you are a young person just let Lucy help you find your way into Narnia and I assure you that you will have a splendid time, but if you are a bit older I recommend this travelog and the company of this wonderfully helpful and insightful book.This book also contains an insightful foreward by Madeleine L'Engle, author of "A Wrinkle in Time".
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This edition corrects many of the mistakes from the previous edition (comments on "adults" in the series comes to mind in particular). An essential guide to Narnia -- the appendices are superb, and the introduction gives several books for further research into Narnia and Lewis.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Whenever I reread the Narnia series, this is right by my elbow to help keep every person and place straight!
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5An absolutely exhaustive reference, thoroughly detailing even the most minor people, places, events and themes. A must have for any lover of the realm. Narnia and the North! Long live the High King!
Book preview
Pocket Companion to Narnia - Paul F. Ford
Pocket Companion to Narnia
A Guide to the Magical World of C. S. Lewis
Paul F. Ford
Illustrated by Lorinda Bryan Cauley
for
Paul Ford
(my namesake)
his brother David and his sister Emily
his mother Laura and his father Raymond (my brother)
John Lake
(who dedicated his first book
to me)
his brothers Erik and Thomas
his mother Silvia and his father Don
Nathan Blackmon
his brothers Andrew and Alex
his mother Sheri and his father Rick
Becky Cerling and Joshua Falconer,
without whom…
all, my companions in Narnia and in life
Contents
Abbreviations
List of Maps, Illustrations, and Diagrams
Using the Pocket Companion
Where to Begin
How to Find an Entry
How to Read a Sample Entry
Bibliography
Variants
Guide to the Most Important Entries
Advice to an Intelligent Reader from an Intelligent Reader or Reading This Will Make You Smarter
In Which Order Should the Chronicles Be Read?
How C. S. Lewis Wrote the Chronicles of Narnia
Sources for Further Help
The Pocket Companion from A to Z
appendix one
List of Comparative Ages of Principal Characters in the Chronicles of Narnia
appendix two
A Narnian Atlas
Where You Will Find More Information in the Full-Size Companion to Narnia
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Praise
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
Image
Eustace, Edmund, and Lucy bid farewell to Reepicheep, the courageous mouse, as his coracle skims the smooth green current and he rides the wave of eternity into Aslan’s country. (VDT 16)
Abbreviations
The books of the Chronicles of Narnia are abbreviated as follows:
List of Maps, Illustrations, and Diagrams
Maps
Narnia
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
The Silver Chair
Illustrations
Eustace, Edmund, and Lucy bid farewell to Reepicheep, the courageous mouse, as his coracle skims the smooth green current and he rides the wave of eternity into Aslan’s country. (VDT 16)
As Mr. Tumnus, the Faun, serves tea, Lucy looks over the curious books on the shelves. (LWW 2)
The stare of the White Witch makes Edmund uncomfortable: She is tall and beautiful, proud and stern; her red lips the only spot of color in a face pale as ice. (LWW 3)
Susan, Lucy, and Edmund help Mrs. Beaver prepare dinner as Peter and Mr. Beaver come in with the main course, fresh-caught trout. (LWW 7)
Susan and Lucy watch in awe as Aslan’s gentle face grows terrible to behold and the very trees bend before the power of his roar. (LWW 16)
While Nikabrik and Trumpkin argue about his fate, Caspian awakes to the smells of a sweet, hot drink being offered him by Trufflehunter, the Talking Badger. (PC 5)
Trufflehunter watches as the Three Bulgy Bears give Caspian the kisses he deserves as a Son of Adam and future king of Narnia. (PC 6)
It is the worst of nights: The Giant Wimbleweather weeps tears of failure; the bloodied bears, the wounded Centaur, and all the other creatures huddle in gloom under the dripping trees. (PC 7)
Eustace weeps huge tears when he sees his dragonish reflection. He wishes more than anything to be human again and back with his companions. (VDT 6)
Coriakin the Magician and Lucy can’t help laughing at the antics of the Duffers. Visible once more, they are hopping about on their monopods like enormous fleas. (VDT 11)
After their trek across the Great Desert, Aravis, Bree, Hwin, and Shasta plunge into a broad pool to cool off. (HHB 9)
The dwarf brothers Rogin, Bricklethumb, and Duffle serve the starving Shasta his first Narnian meal. (HHB 12)
Jill and Eustace talk to Puddleglum as the Marsh-wiggle explains—as Marsh-wiggles will—that he is fishing for eels, though he doesn’t expect to catch any. (SC 5)
When Scrubb, Jill, and Puddleglum discover the giants’ recipes for cooking Men and Marsh-wiggles, they realize they must flee Harfang before the giant cook wakes up and turns them into dinner. (SC 9)
The Queen of Underland transforms herself into a hideous, seething serpent and coils herself around Rilian. Scrubb and Puddleglum come to his rescue with swords at the ready while Jill looks on in horror and tries not to faint. (SC 12)
As the four Overlanders—Puddleglum, Jill, Eustace, and Rilian—look on, the gnomes rejoice at the news of the wicked Queen of Underland’s death. (SC 14)
Queen Jadis hangs on in rage as the magic rings transport Digory and Polly out of Charn and into the timeless Wood between the Worlds. (MN 5)
The animals of Narnia spring joyously from the earth, brought forth by Aslan’s song of creation. (MN 9)
Sorely tempted to disobey Aslan and eat a silver apple from the Tree of Protection, Digory wrestles with his conscience. He is watched by the evil witch and a wonderful, mysterious bird. (MN 13)
Tied to a tree by the Calormenes and left to be killed by the followers of the false Aslan, Tirian is fed by three mice, two moles, and a rabbit. (LB 4)
It is Aslan’s final coming. He bounds down the rainbow cliffs, a herald of power and glory. (LB 16)
Diagrams
The Narnian Continent
Narnia’s Lantern Waste
Narnia’s Eastern Peninsula
Eastern Edge of the Narnian World
Cross Section of the Narnian World
Basic Elemental Makeup of the Narnian World
The Wood between the Worlds
Aslan’s Country and Surrounding Worlds
Aslan’s Country in Relation to the Wood between the Worlds
Aslan’s Country, Topography
Aslan’s Country Meets the Narnian World
Using the Pocket Companion
A simplified version of this section
is available for printing as a bookmark at my website:
www.pford.stjohnsem.edu/ford/cslewis/narnia.htm.
Where to Begin
You have begun in the right place by coming to this page. If you have not read the Chronicles, read them first (in the order 245-3617
—see below, 14–15).
After you have read each book, then come back to this page and read these few pages called "Using the Pocket Companion. Then read
Advice to an Intelligent Reader from an Intelligent Reader or Reading This Will Make You Smarter."
For a more directed study of the Chronicles, see Guide to the Most Important Entries
at the end of this section. Reading any of the Major Characters and Items
(listed there) will also lead you into the heart of this Pocket Companion.
How to Find an Entry
Entries are in alphabetical order. Characters are listed by first name (e.g., Andrew Ketterley is listed under A
for Andrew), and honorifics or titles are left off (e.g., Prince Caspian is listed under C
for Caspian, and Mr. Beaver is listed under B
for Beaver, Mr.).
How to Read a Sample Entry
ENTRY TITLES— Abbreviated book titles and chapter numbers indicate where the topic under discussion can be found in the Chronicles. For instance, SC 3 and 4
refers you to chapters 3 and 4 of The Silver Chair. Small Capitals are used to alert you to a cross reference, namely, a separate entry on this person, place, thing, or idea.¹ Singular and plural verb and noun forms of the entry title will both be set in small capitals (e.g., animal and animals, pray and prayer). Some longer titles, such as Seven friends of Narnia and Castle of the White Witch, are listed under the first word of that phrase, not the last (i.e., Seven…
and Castle…
). On those rare occasions when two cross references are run together, an asterisk functions as a divider between these cross references. For example, under Adults, the phrase Digory recognizes right away that Uncle Andrew is an evil* magician
indicates that you will find more information at Andrew, at Evil, and at Magician. [SPOILER(S)]
means Don’t read the next sentence/paragraph if you have not yet read the book in question because it tells you something very important to the story.
At the end of some entries you will find cross references not specifically mentioned in the text listed in [brackets].
[astronomy, narnian; providence.]
Bibliography
I use the following short titles and abbreviations in the notes. Here is more information:
The Abolition of Man
(first published in 1946; now available from HarperSanFrancisco, 2001)
Biography
Roger Lancelyn Green and Walter Hooper, C. S. Lewis: A Biography (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1974, and London: Collins, 1974)
Christian Reflections
Walter Hooper, ed. (Grand Rapids:
Eerdmans, 1967)
The Discarded Image
(London: Cambridge University Press, 1964)
Essays Presented to Charles Williams
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1947; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1966)
The Four Loves
(New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1960)
God in the Dock
Walter Hooper, ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,1970)
The Great Divorce
(first published in 1946; now available from HarperSanFrancisco, 2001)
Hooper
Walter Hooper, C. S. Lewis: A Companion and
Guide (London: HarperCollins, 1996)
The Land of Narnia
Brian Sibley, The Land of Narnia: Brian Sibley Explores the World of C. S. Lewis (New York: HarperTrophy, 1998)
Letters to an American Lady
Clyde S. Kilby, ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1967)
Letters to Children
C. S. Lewis Letters to Children, Lyle K. Dorsett and Marjorie Lamp Mead, eds. (New York: Macmillan, 1985; Scribner, 1996)
Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer
(New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1964)
Letters II
C. S. Lewis: Collected Letters, Volume II: Books, Broadcasts and War 1931–1949 (London: HarperCollins, 2004)
Letters 1988
Letters of C. S. Lewis, W. H. Lewis, ed., revised and enlarged by Walter Hooper (San Diego: Harcourt Brace, 1988)
Mere Christianity
(first published in 1952; now available from HarperSanFrancisco, 2001)
Miracles
(first published in 1947; revised 1960; now available from HarperSanFrancisco, 2001)
Of Other Worlds
Walter Hooper, ed. (New York: Harcourt Brace & World, 1966)
Past Watchful Dragons
Walter Hooper (New York: Macmillan, 1979)
Perelandra
(first published in 1943; latest edition from
Scribner, 2003)
The Problem of Pain
(first published in 1940; now available from HarperSanFrancisco, 2001)
The Screwtape Letters
(first published in 1942; now available from HarperSanFrancisco, 2001)
Surprised by Joy
(New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1955)
The Weight of Glory
(first published in 1949; revised in 1980; now available from HarperSanFrancisco, 2001)
The World’s Last Night
(New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1960)
Variants
The most significant differences between the pre-1994 American and the British editions (now the English editions for the world) of the Chronicles are noted in the entries Dream(s), Fenris Ulf, Secret Hill, and World Ash Tree.
In this Pocket Companion to Narnia, American edition(s)
= Any edition of the Chronicles of Narnia typeset and printed in the United States of America before 1994. These editions have the changes Lewis made after he had proofread the second set of galleys sent to him by his American publisher. Since he rarely made any changes, these are significant. (See Advice to an Intelligent Reader, 11.)
British edition(s)
= Any edition of the Chronicles of Narnia typeset and printed in Great Britain before 1994 and any edition in the English language published anywhere in the world after 1994; after this date the volumes are renumbered according to the order of the internal chronology. These editions do not contain the changes Lewis made after he had proofread the second set of galleys sent to him by his American publisher.
Guide to the Most Important Entries
Major Characters and Places. The following entries are major characters and places and are a good place to start your reading of this Pocket Companion to Narnia.
Aravis, Aslan, Bree, Cair Paravel, Caspian X (Prince Caspian), Digory Kirke, Edmund Pevensie, Eustace Clarence Scrubb, Hwin, Jill Pole, Lucy Pevensie, Narnia, Peter Pevensie, Polly Plummer, Puddleglum, Reepicheep, Shasta, Susan Pevensie, White Witch.
Another way to begin is by consulting the following essential entries.
For the Chronicles of Narnia in general:
Using the Pocket Companion, Advice to an Intelligent Reader, Aslan; Autobiographical allusion(s); Biblical allusion(s); Feeling(s); Imagination; Literary allusion(s); Magic; Mythology; Profession(s) of faith; Stock response(s).
If you have time, see also: Adult(s); Animal(s); Autobiographical Allusion(s); Children; For the first time
; Geography, Narnian (plus the maps in the middle of the book); King(s), queen(s); Pain; Plato; Prayer; Providence; Silence; Sleep; Smell(s); Sound(s); Youth; and Appendices One and Two.
For Book One: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
Aslan’s name; Aslan’s voice; Centaurs; Depravity; Domesticity; Dryad(s); Edmund Pevensie; Emperor-beyond-the-Sea; Hierarchy; King(s), queen(s); Lucy Pevensie; Magic; Numinous; Peter Pevensie; Plato; Son of Adam, Daughter of Eve; Susan Pevensie; Tree(s); Tumnus; White Witch.
For Book Two: Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia
Astronomy, Narnian; Caspian X; Courtesy; Dance; Dwarf(s); Fear; Greatness of God; Honor; Hope(s); Longing; Practical Notes; Revelry; Robe(s); School(s); Telmar; Time; Transition(s); Trufflehunter; Trumpkin.
For Book Three: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Adventure; Aslan’s country; Coriakin; Courage; Cowardice; Dark Island; DAWN TREADER, Dawn Treader, Dream(s); Duffer(s); Eustace Clarence Scrubb; Privacy; Reepicheep; Silence; Star(s); Vanity.
For Book Four: The Horse and His Boy
Aravis; Bree; Comfort; Cry(ing); Horse(s); Hwin; Obedience; Rabadash; Sexism; Shasta; Trinity; Youth
For Book Five: The Silver Chair
Cry(ing); Jill Pole; Memory; Puddleglum; Queen of Underland; Quest; Reductionism; Rilian; Underland; Youth.
For Book Six: The Magician’s Nephew
Andrew Ketterley; Charn; Curiosity; Digory Kirke; Greed; Humor; Polly Plummer; Positivity; Right and wrong; Wood between the Worlds.
For Book Seven: The Last Battle
Death; Dog(s); Door(s); Emeth; Eschatology; History; Jewel; Joy; Judgment; Last Battle(s); Puzzle; Railway accident; Shift; Stable; Tash; Technology; Term-time; Tirian; Universalism.
Advice to an Intelligent Reader
from an Intelligent Reader or
Reading This Will Make You Smarter
This book has many spoilers! Please read the Chronicles of Narnia first. Only then read this Pocket Companion. I can’t be your companion until you have gone there
first.
C. S. Lewis wrote these books for you, and he meant you to read them with your head and your heart and your feelings. The books are so exciting that you will probably race through them the first time. OK.
But when you reread them, pay attention to the color words, the verbs, the adjectives, and the adverbs.
Try to avoid looking for hidden meanings, as if the Chronicles were codebooks.
C. S. Lewis was very careful not to decode the Chronicles for the children who wrote him about their meaning. Typical of his responses is the answer he made to Hila Newman when she wrote to him about the meaning of the ending of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader:
As to Aslan’s other name, well I want you to guess. Has there never been anyone in this world who (1) Arrived at the same time as Father Christmas (2) Said he was the son of the Great Emperor (3) Gave himself up for someone else’s fault to be jeered at and killed by wicked people (4) Came to life again (5) Is sometimes spoken of as a Lamb (see the end of The Dawn Treader). Don’t you really know His name in this world? Think it over and let me know your answer! (Letters to Children, 3 June 1953)
In Which Order Should the
Chronicles Be Read?
The Order by Year of First Publication—
the Canonical Order
Before 1994 there was only one reading order, what scholars have come to call the canonical order, the order in which the chronicles were first published, and they were numbered accordingly:
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (published 1950)
The Horse and His Boy (published 1954)
The Magician’s Nephew (published 1955)
The Last Battle (published 1956)
So, although C. S. Lewis completed The Horse and His Boy before The Silver Chair, the latter was published first, in order to keep together the triad of books in which Caspian is a major character.
The Order by Internal Chronology—
the Chronological Order
Very quickly, readers noticed that the stories were not in the order of their internal chronology, and some wrote Lewis about the issue. Here is a typical reply, written on 23 April 1957 but not published until 1985:
Dear Laurence
I think I agree with your order for reading the books more than with your mother’s.¹ The series was not planned beforehand as she thinks. When I wrote The Lion [, the Witch and the Wardrobe] I did not know I was going to write any more. Then I wrote P.[rince] Caspian as a sequel and still didn’t think there would be any more, and when I had done The Voyage [of the Dawn Treader] I felt quite sure it would be the last. But I found I was wrong. So perhaps it does not matter very much in which order anyone reads them. I’m not even sure that all the others were written in the same order in which they were published. I never keep notes of that sort of thing and never remember dates.
This letter suggested the change that HarperCollins implemented in 1994 when the decision was made to make the British editions the world English editions. This has come to be called the chronological order.
The Magician’s Nephew
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Horse and His Boy
Prince Caspian
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
The Silver Chair
The Last Battle
Most scholars and fans disagree with this decision and find it the least faithful to Lewis’s deepest intentions and to the meanings the books have acquired among the most devoted readers.
The Best Reading Order—the Order by Essential
Completion by Lewis Himself
Remember 245-3617
The Pocket Companion to Narnia studies the Chronicles in a slight adaptation of the canonical order, what I have called the order by essential completion.
This order makes possible the reading of the book with the heart by attending to them in the order in which they came to Lewis’s own heart and mind.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (spring 1949)
Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia (fall 1949)
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (winter 1950)
The Horse and His Boy (spring 1950)
The Silver Chair (spring 1951)
The Magician’s Nephew (fall 1951)
The Last Battle (spring 1953)
I urge all readers of the Chronicles of Narnia to Remember ‘245-3617,’
that is, rearrange the post-1994 HarperCollins reordering before you read the books!
My worry is that the decision to reorder the books chronologically diminishes their impact on future readers, indeed, impedes readers from moving from The Magician’s Nephew to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and thus to the end, which is only the beginning of the real story.
Consider how The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe introduces the mystery of a world within a wardrobe and builds to the first use of the name Narnia
in paragraph 10 of Chapter 2 and the revelation of Aslan in Chapter 7, A Day with the Beavers.
Contrariwise, The Magician’s Nephew plops the reader unmysteriously into the plot of the whole series, using Narnia
as the fortieth word a reader will now encounter.
But the pivotal insight that clinches the argument is found in the scene just cited: "None of the children knew who Aslan was any more than you do; but the moment the Beaver had spoken these words everyone felt quite different."² The five words I have emphasized show that we must read the books in the order in which they first came to the attention of the world of readers and rereaders, in the order in which the meaning of these glorious books grew beyond Lewis’s late-formed intention to revise them. His intention to emend the books—agreed to just two days before he died—is inferior to his attention to their meaning and their success at that level (his deeper intention).
If Lewis had been able to complete his intended revision, perhaps the chronological order would be the better. But the 245-3617 order
or the canonical order is to be preferred. Why? Helping to avoid the ever-present danger of decoding the Chronicles, these orderings carry the reader along in a less logical, less factual mode and present the pictures and the meanings of Lewis’s stories in the way he first decided to tell them and in the way the first readers of the Chronicles enjoyed them.
How C. S. Lewis Wrote the
Chronicles of Narnia
You can save the following, final piece of advice for reading later. It helps you get an overview of what C. S. Lewis was doing. Warning: SPOILERS ahead!
It is important to be aware of the fact that, unlike J. K. Rowling and her Harry Potter series, Lewis did not begin with any plan to write seven chronicles of Narnia.
Lewis seems to have worked out of four separate spurts of creative energy left over from his having just finished a very important book of philosophy and theology called Miracles. The first spurt of energy produced The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and a rough draft of The Magician’s Nephew, named The Lefay Fragment.
³ The second resulted in Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. The third was responsible for The Horse and His Boy. And the final impulse saw The Silver Chair, The Last Battle, and The Magician’s Nephew (finished in that order).
Lewis’s First Burst of Narnian Creativity
(summer of 1948 to summer of 1949)
It could very well be that finishing Miracles and starting his autobiography, Surprised by Joy, in the spring of 1948, released in Lewis the energy to return to a book he had started and left off at the beginning of World War II with the arrival of the three girls evacuated from London.⁴ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is caught up in describing the new world of Narnia, its enchantment by the White Witch, the lot of the Talking Beasts and the mythological creatures under her rule, the transformation of the country by the intervention of the Great Lion, and its subsequent rule by the four English children. The Lefay Fragment
⁵ seems to convey that Lewis wasn’t yet ready to write the creation story of Narnia because he had not lived long enough in the world and with the characters he had created
⁶ and he wasn’t far enough along in the understanding of the meaning of his own life story to appreciate what was happening to him in his own writing. He set aside this rough draft of The Magician’s Nephew and paused.
Lewis’s Second Burst of Narnian Creativity
(summer of 1949 to fall of 1950)
The subtitle of Prince Caspian, The Return to Narnia,
provides the most important clue as to Lewis’s intended meanings for the work (no other chronicle has a subtitle). The subtitle suggests that the book can be seen as a rough draft of The Last Battle in that both books ask the questions Is the Christian story real now or only something that may have happened long ago?
and What does the effect of the passage of time have on the reality and experience of faith?
(Prince Caspian twice refers to the events of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as the golden age.
) In Prince Caspian there are also pre-echoes of a major theme in both The Last Battle and also The Magician’s Nephew: the right and wrong uses of nature and people.⁷ Prince Caspian concentrates even more on the geography, astronomy, and history of Narnia and adds considerably to the cast of characters. Aslan sends the boys and Trumpkin to war alongside Caspian while he and the girls will liberate Narnia through the ecstatic.⁸
Then, in almost an excess of imaginative energy, Lewis wrote—in less than three months—The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which takes the reader from the slave-trading intrigues on islands close to Narnia to the very threshold of Aslan’s country in a high point of what we would have to call mysticism.⁹ Lewis intended to end the Chronicles with The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, as you can see in the last scene of the book.
Lewis made the most significant change in all of the Chronicles when he revised the ending of Chapter XII of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The Dark Island.
Between the time he corrected the galley proofs of the British edition and the time he corrected the galley proofs of the American edition, he delivered the address On Three Ways of Writing for Children
to the British Library Association. When someone objected that fairy tales are too violent for children, Lewis said: I suffered too much from nightfears myself in childhood to undervalue this objection. I would not wish to heat the fires of that private hell for any child.
He seems to have had second thoughts about whether The Dark Island
was too frightening¹⁰ and made the changes detailed in the entry Dream(s).
Lewis’s Third Burst of Narnian Creativity
(spring and summer of 1950)
After a pause of at least two months, Lewis, like a portraitist finished with his main subject, started The Horse and His Boy to fill in the background by telling a story that takes place in Calormen and Archenland.¹¹ Along the way, however, much as Shasta encounters Aslan in the fog (Chapter XI, a foreshadowing of Emeth in The Last Battle), Lewis was also overwhelmed.
Remember, Lewis was writing his autobiography at the same time. Imagine the effect on Lewis of taking the invitation Aslan makes to Shasta, Tell me your sorrows,
as an invitation addressed to himself. What a process for all of us readers, and what a climax in the vision of Aslan that rewards Shasta’s honest dialogue!
Lewis’s Final Burst of Narnian Creativity
(summer of 1950 to spring of 1953)
So, after a second pause, of at least four months, Lewis plunged into the creation of the last three chronicles. He finished The Silver Chair first, labored at The Magician’s Nephew, leaving it with some threads untied, and went on to start and complete The Last Battle before finally completing The Magician’s Nephew.
The tone has changed when we enter the world of The Silver Chair.¹² The scene is Experiment House, the progressive school that Eustace Scrubb attends. In this fifth chronicle (published fourth), Lewis shows how aware he was of the two senses of the word spell. Tolkien had written, "Small wonder that spell means