Narnia 101
Brad Mercer
What are The Chronicles of Narnia?
Lewis’s well-known children’s
books tell the story of creation, redemption, and consummation in the world of
Narnia, a fictional land populated by whimsical creatures ranging from talking
beavers and fauns to wicked white witches to wood nymphs and dryads to Father
Christmas. The focal point of all events in Narnia is Aslan, the good but
dangerous lion, the High King, and the son of the Emperor-beyond-the-Sea. His
piercing yet comforting gaze and all-powerful yet assuring providence come
together in an artistic synthesis that is arguably one of Lewis’s greatest
literary achievements. From 1950 through 1956, Lewis produced seven Narnia
books.
In
what order should I read the Chronicles?
There is no doubt about the order in which the books were written and
published, but scholars continue to debate the best reading order. Make your
own choice, but I recommend starting with The Magician’s Nephew or The
Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe.
Where did Lewis get the name “Aslan”?
Aslan is the Turkish word for lion. Lewis’s close friend, Charles Williams, wrote a book entitled, The Place of the Lion. The lion is the traditional symbol associated with Lewis’s childhood church, St. Mark’s Anglican Church in Dundela, which is located on the outskirts of Belfast. Most importantly, Jesus Christ is referred to in Scripture as the “Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David” (Rev 5:5, Gen 49:9, Isaiah 11:10).
Where did Lewis get the name “Narnia”?
Paul Ford maintains that “Lewis probably chose the name Narnia for his imaginary world because His liked the sound of the word.” Since Lewis’s first successes at Oxford were in the classics and ancient history, it is quite possible that he came across at least seven references to Narnia in Latin literature. Livy's History, Tacitus's Annals, Pliny the Elder's Natural History, and Pliny the Younger's letters all contain references to Narnia. Walter Hooper mentions a map of Italy from "Murrey's Small Classical Atlas" that had once belonged to Lewis. On the map Lewis had underlined several towns, one of which is Narnia. Narnia is now named NARNI, a town outside of Rome.
What was Lewis’s purpose for writing the Chronicles?
Clyde Kilby contends that Lewis’s Narnia tales are set in the context of what might be properly called a cosmos because they take “account of our world, the world of Narnia, and the heavens themselves.” Like Edmund, Lucy, and Eustace stepping into the painting in Voyage of the ‘Dawn Treader’ and personally experiencing a new, yet somewhat familiar world, Lewis believes that readers should step inside of, and experience, good stories. Well-written stories might be whimsical, fantastic, and enjoyable, but this should not imply that they do not communicate meaning. In his essay, “Bluspels and Flalansferes: A Semantic Nightmare,” Lewis asserts that “Reason is the natural organ of truth; but imagination is the organ of meaning.”
Thomas Howard aptly describes Lewis’s purpose this way:
One way of putting what Lewis saw as his literary task would be to say that he wanted to lead his readers to a window, looking out from the dark stuffy room of modernity, and to burst open the shutters and point us all to an enormous vista stretching away from the room in which we are shut. He despaired of finding any furniture, pictures, or objects in that small room that would suggest what he wanted to say to us; we must come to the window and look out.
Imaginative stories bridge the gulf between abstract, intellectual knowing and concrete experience because the reader understands and embraces the story for its own sake from inside the story itself.
Are the Chronicles allegories?
No. They are “supposals.” The Chronicles have a pedagogical purpose, but they are not allegories. In Out of the Silent Planet, Ransom concludes that one way to protect the world from the cosmic evils of Weston is “to publish in the form of fiction what would certainly not be listened to as fact.” He says, “what we need for the moment is not so much a body of belief as a body of people familiarized with certain ideas.” This is important to keep in mind, because Lewis insists that in The Chronicles of Narnia he is not drawing allegorical parallels between religious or philosophical concepts and specific events, people, or objects. He is writing “supposals.” In a letter to Mrs. Hook (I know Martha Hook personally, and she confirmed to me the authenticity of this letter), December 29, 1958, Lewis writes,
By an allegory I mean a composition (whether pictorial or literary) in which immaterial realities are represented by feigned physical objects e.g. a pictured Cupid allegorically represents erotic love (which in reality is an experience, not an object occupying a given area of space) or, in Bunyan a giant represents Despair. If Aslan represented the immaterial Deity in the same way in which Giant Despair represents Despair, he would be an allegorical figure. In reality however he is an invention giving an imaginary answer to the question, ‘What might Christ become like if there really were a world like Narnia and He chose to be incarnate and die and rise again in that world as he actually has done in ours?’ This is not allegory at all. So in ‘Perelandra.’ This also works out a supposition. (‘Suppose, even now, in some other planet there were a first couple undergoing the same that Adam and Eve underwent here, but successfully.’) Allegory and such supposals differ because they mix the real and the unreal in different ways.
Lewis’s purpose for the Chronicles is further clarified in his Letters to Children. In a letter addressed June 8, 1960, to a young girl named Patricia, Lewis emphasizes that he is not using symbols in the Chronicles to represent the historic Christian story. The Son of God created Narnia, but Narnia is “not specifically our world.” Jadis’s picking of the apple, like Adam’s picking of the apple, is an act of disobedience, but there is no one-to-one correspondence between Jadis and Adam. The stone table is not Moses’s table. It is meant to “remind one of Moses’ table.” The passion and resurrection of Aslan depict what the passion and resurrection of Christ “might be supposed” to have been like in another world. Edmund and Judas have similar character traits, but they are not literary parallels. In the seventh Narnia book, The Last Battle, Ape and Puzzle are like the Antichrist who comes just before the final judgment, but they do not correspond exactly to the biblical account of the Antichrist.
Is Aslan a Christ figure?
While communicating his vision of “mere Christianity” in the Chronicles, Lewis is careful not to translate his meanings too precisely when answering letters. When asked to be explicitly clear regarding Aslan’s identity, he writes,
As to Aslan’s other name, well I want you to guess. Has there ever 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. . . . Don’t you really know His name in this world. Think it over and let me know your answer.
Clearly, for Lewis, there is a sense in which Aslan is “real.” When a nine-year-old American boy’s mother writes to ask him if her son is committing idolatry by loving Aslan more than Christ, he responds, “But Laurence can’t really love Aslan more than Jesus, even if he feels that’s what he’s doing. For the things he loves Aslan for doing and saying are simply the things Jesus really did and said.” Lewis’s letters of 1957 are particularly revealing for their expressions of faith and trust in “Aslan” during his wife’s period of illness:
Well, I can’t say I have had a happy Easter, for I have lately got married and my wife is very, very ill. I am sure Aslan knows best and whether He leaves her with me or takes her to His own country, He will do what is right. But of course it makes me very sad. I am sure you and your mother will pray for us [emphasis mine].
Last year I married, at her bedside in the hospital, a woman who seemed to be dying. So you can imagine it was a sad wedding. But Aslan has done great things for us and she is now walking about again, showing the doctors how wrong they were, and making me very happy [emphasis mine].
Ford calls Aslan “the apex of C.S. Lewis’s literary, mythopoeic, and apologetic gifts,” because more than any other Lewis character he displays the author’s deepest reflections upon enjoying God and his creation.
For Further Reading
Paul Ford’s, Companion to Narnia (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1994).
Walter Hooper’s, C.S. Lewis: A Complete Guide to His Life & Works (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1996).
There are several helpful new books on understanding Narnia in the church bookstore.