The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is a fantasy novel for children by C. S. Lewis. It was the first of The Chronicles of Narnia to be written, in 1953, and is the best known. (Though traditionally known as the first book in the series, it is the second book in chronological order, and its prequel "The Magician's Nephew" is currently marketed as Book 1.)

Synopsis

Four children, Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy Pevensie, are evacuated from London during World War II, and settled with an elderly Professor in a large country-house.

The children explore, and Lucy, the youngest of the children, climbs into a wardrobe and finds it leads to a snow-covered land. She meets a faun, Tumnus, who tells her that the land is called Narnia, and that it is ruled over by the ruthless White Witch, who ensures that it is always winter. As he puts it so fittingly, "Always winter, but never Christmas, think of that!"

Lucy goes back through the wardrobe, which returns to normal, and is unable to convince the other children about her adventure.

Several weeks later, she re-enters Narnia, and Edmund follows. He fails to catch up with Lucy, and instead comes across the witch, who seduces him with sweets and promises of power. She persuades him to try to bring the other children to her castle.

The witch departs, Lucy arrives, and both Lucy and Edmund return together through the wardrobe. With fear of being ridiculed, Edmund will not admit to the others that Narnia is real.

Finally, circumstances lead all four children to hide in the wardrobe, and they soon find themselves In Narnia. They discover that Tumnus has been captured, and the children are sheltered by a pair of talking beavers named, appropriately, Mr. Beaver and Mrs. Beaver.

They recount an ancient prophecy that when two Sons of Adam and two Daughters of Eve fill the four thrones at Cair Paravel (the capital city of Narnia), the witch's power will fail. The beavers tell of the true king of Narnia—a great lion called Aslan—who has been absent for many years, but is now "On the move again."

Edmund, still in the thrall of the witch, runs away to find her. His absence is not noticed until it is too late. Realising that they have been betrayed, the others set off to meet with Aslan.

Edmund, meanwhile, reaches the castle of the witch. She treats him harshly and, taking him with her, sets off to catch the other children.

However, her power is failing and a thaw strands her sleigh. The other children reach Aslan, and a penitent Edmund is rescued just as the witch is about to kill him.

Calling for a truce, the witch demands that Edmund be returned to her, as an ancient law gives her possession of all traitors. Aslan, acknowledging the law, offers himself in Edmund's place and the witch accepts.

Aslan is sacrificed by the witch, but comes back to life, and, during a final battle, the witch is defeated and killed.

The children become kings and queens, and spend many years in Narnia, growing to maturity, before returning to our world, where they find themselves children again, returned to the normal world, where they find to their surprise that hardly any time has passed since their departure

Adaptations

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has been adapted for television, stage, radio and cinema (see also The Chronicles of Narnia (TV miniseries)). A Walt Disney Pictures film, entitled The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was released in December 2005 and has grossed over $700 million worldwide.

Commentary

The story takes inspiration from the Gospel themes of betrayal, death, resurrection and redemption. The "Deep Magic from the Dawn of Time," and "Deeper Magic from Before the Dawn of Time" can be seen as similar to the Old and New Covenants of Christianity, respectively. In the subsequent books, there is a nod in the direction of the Trinity concept, with Aslan in the Christ-role and a passing reference to the "Emperor over Sea" as God the Father. The children form a disciple-group around Aslan, with Edmund as Judas and Peter the High King as St Peter. The two girls also follow Biblical precedent, as Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, through being first to see the resurrected Aslan. In addition, there are various allusions to Christ's execution, including the humiliation prior to his death and the splitting of the curtain in the Temple, represented by the cracking of the stone table. The book is not intended to be a retelling of Biblical stories in another form; it simply borrows ideas from them so as to illustrate basic conceptions of Christianity (and some other ideas as well — Platonic philosophy among them).

J. R. R. Tolkien was a close friend of Lewis', a fellow member of the Inklings, and an early reader of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. However, despite his sharing Lewis' Christian faith, Tolkien was rather dismissive of the book. He considered its theology to be both blatant and naive, and the mixture of different mythic elements very inconsistent. He specifically objected to the curious presence of Father Christmas, and the mixture of both Norse and Greek mythologies. In addition, he came to dislike the avuncular manner of story-telling for children — which can also be found at points in The Hobbit (Being something of a perfectionist, he later had to stop himself from rewriting that book, as told in Humphrey Carpenter's biography).

When he wrote The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Lewis did not intend for it to be part of a larger work; this may account for several inconsistencies in the series. For example, The Horse and His Boy establishes that humans live in both Archenland and Calormen during the reign of the witch, which makes the reliance on the presence of the children to break the witch's spell somewhat confusing. This, however, loses ambiguity if one considers the possibility that the witch's reign of winter was only over the realm of Narnia and not over Calormen or Archenland. Nor is there any explanation as to what has become of the descendants of the original (human) rulers of Narnia, whose dynasty was ordained by Aslan in The Magician's Nephew.

Although not specific to this book (and therefore dealt with in more detail in The Chronicles of Narnia entry), several controversies exist regarding the acceptability of the chronicles in today's climate, given their Christian content, as well as other aspects.

Influences

Professor Kirke is based on W.T. Kirkpatrick, who tutored a 16-year-old Lewis. "Kirk," as he was sometimes called, taught the young Lewis much about thinking and communicating clearly, skills that would be invaluable to him later ^*.

Narnia is caught in endless winter when the children first enter. Norse mythology also has a "great winter", known as the Fimbulwinter that is said to precede Ragnarok.

The dwarves and giants are from Norse mythology. Fauns, centaurs, minotaurs, dryads, etc. are all from Greek mythology. Father Christmas, of course, was part of popular English folk lore.

The main story is an allegory of Christ's crucifixion. Aslan sacrifices Himself for Edmund, a traitor who deserved death, in the same way that Christ sacrificed Himself for sinners. The cross is replaced by the Stone Table (which were used in Celtic religion). As with the Christian Passion, it is women (Susan and Lucy) who tend Aslan's body after he dies and are the first to see him after his resurrection.

The freeing of Aslan's body from the stone table by field mice is reminiscent of Aesop's Fable of "The Lion and the Mouse." In the fable, a lion catches a mouse, but lets him go free. The mouse promises to return the favour and does so when he gnaws through the lion's bonds after he has been captured by hunters^*.

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