Re: Summer Challenge 2016 Sharing Thread
Posted: Tue Aug 09, 2016 2:44 pm
Chapter 11.1: Aslan Leads
"Hi! Lucy! Look out, for goodness' sake. You're right on the edge of the gorge. Come back - " and then, a moment later, Edmunds voice saying "No, she's right. There is a way down."
The passage where Aslan leads the Children along the side of the gorge and finally to Aslan's How is beautiful. It's a lovely symbol of how God will lead us by the best path, even though to us it might seem treacherous. He knows the paths so much better than we do and it was only when the children trusted Aslan that they could find a way through.
This is summed up in Peter's confession: "I've been leading them wrong ever since we started and especially yesterday morning." I love that Aslan doesn't chastise him. He accepts Peter's confession with the loving words "My dear son."
I don't know how many of you have read Lewis' A Pilgrim's Regress. It's a rather difficult book because unlike The Chronicles it really is an allegory and the symbolism is difficult. (Lewis confesses in the preface to the version I have that he hadn't realised not everyone had the same journey to Christianity as him and he assumed that people would understand his symbolism more easily). Anyway, in the story, the protagonist, John, comes to a huge canyon which he cannot cross and much of the book is about him trying different ways to get across it and failing till he eventually realises that he cannot do it on his own. The first time I read it, I remember thinking how it was a bit like this part of Prince Caspian. Pilgrim's Regress was published in 1933, long before PC, but I think perhaps Lewis was trying to reuse the same allegory in a simpler form here.
Chapter 11.2: Bacchus
I've shared some of this before (we had a thread on the old forum about it) but some of you won't have seen that discussion so I thought I'd share it again. I always found the passage with Bacchus really odd. When I was doing my undergrad in classics, we did a section on Dionysus (the more common Greek name for the same god - we even studied a Greek play called The Bacchae) and I was even more confused. Bacchus was the god of wine and revelry and, from a Christian perspective, represents some of the greatest debauchery of Greek paganism. I remember learning about Silenus and the Maenads too, which was cool because now I knew who they were. But I did find their whole inclusion really odd. (As an aside, I also remember when I was doing first year Greek and, in our text book, the characters all go to a festival of Dionysus and there's this bit in the passage where the revellers shout: "eleleu, iou, iou!" which was glossed as "untranslatable ritual chants" and I remember thinking "Ooh! that's where Lewis got that from!" He has a slightly different version, but it's similar enough, that I'm sure they're both associated with the festival chants). What really confused me was what on earth these characters were doing in a Christian book? Then, one day I was reading LWW and saw something I had never noticed before, which suddenly made a bit more sense of the whole thing.
When Lucy realises here who the strange wild people are, she says to Susan, "Don't you remember Mr Tumnus telling us about them long ago?" Obviously, these conversations must have happened after the coronation for Susan to have heard them, but that wasn't the first time Tumnus told Lucy about them. On Lucy's first visit to Narnia, Mr Tumnus tells her about the good old days, before the White Witch, when they would have midnight dances and hunting parties and feasts and treasure hunts. He also tells her "about summer when the woods were green and old Silenus on his fat donkey would come to visit them, and sometimes Bacchus himself, and then the streams would run with wine instead of water and the whole forest would give itself up to jollification for weeks on end." He ends his tale with the sad line, "Not that it isn't always winter now."
When I discovered this passage, I suddenly felt like I understood a bit better what was going on in PC. The mention of Bacchus and Silenus in LWW might have just been a throw-away sentence. Fauns are closely associated with Bacchus in Greek mythology, so it makes sense that Mr Tumnus would mention their presence as representing the good old days of Narnia (days that no longer came now that the Witch made it eternal winter). Bacchus and Silenus belonged to a time before the Golden Age and before the White Witch's reign. In a way it symbolised the wild part of Narnia (the animals and mythical creatures) in their element. Lewis, for some reason, decides to harken back to this mention by Tumnus in the next book (remembering PC was published next after LWW). In the same way that the appearance of Father Christmas marked the Witch losing her power in LWW, so Bacchus' return here was a sign to the Old Narnians that things were being made right again. You might ask why Bacchus only returns now, and not during the Golden Age, and I don't really know the answer, but it seems rather fitting to have him appear here where the focus is on liberating the Old Narnians from repressive Telmarine rule.
One of the things Lewis seems to do with the Greek (and other) mythologies in Narnia, is "redeem" them. He was of the opinion that mythologies were based on partial truths that had been distorted. The Christian story was the "true myth". So he takes these pagan characters and creatures and puts them into a Christian setting. Bacchus and the maenads are no longer the decadent characters of Greek myth but something positive. They had been associated with drinking and drunkenness, but here they are associated with fruitfulness and plenty, making vines grow and allowing nature to reclaim what was taken from it. Instead of being associated with violence, they are simply wild (untamed). They are rather startling to Lucy and Susan who come from a world of order and a controlled society, but they are not bad. Also Aslan, is there to keep them safe (which is interesting, since he himself is "not a tame lion" - but in his untameness he is good and the girls know that).
I'd love to know what versions of the myths of Dionysus Lewis was familiar with. Were there stories he read as a child which already partially redeemed or put Bacchus, Silenus and the Maenads into a "safer" setting? How did he encounter them in school (school syllabuses in those days had far more inclusion of Classical literature and languages than they do now)? Or did he simply know about them from the days of his Classics degree? Whether it was from his own background or his own decision, it seems that Lewis' point here is to put mythical and pagan characters into a safer setting, at the same time elaborating on Mr Tumnus' passing comment about them in LWW.
Chapter 12: Nikabrik's Lies
I've noticed before that there are a few passages in The Chronicles where one of the bad characters tries to fool the heroes by cleverly formulated lies. They mix in enough truth to make it seem believable but then twist that truth. Lewis seems to have been strongly aware of how this kind of deception works and portraying examples of it. We see this best in Screwtape Letters where the demons describe how to trick humans. We also see it in the LotGK's speech about there being no such thing as overland or the sun in SC, in the way Shift tricks Puzzle into wearing the Lionskin (and in Shift's speeches on Stable Hill) in TLB and in the lies about Aslan as an evil lion that had developed in Calormen in HHB. Here, Nikabrik twists the truth by trying to make the others doubt what they knew about both the White Witch and Aslan.
That we should no longer be children, tossed about to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting (Eph 4:14)
But evil men and imposters will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you learned them. (2 Tim 3:13-14)
"Hi! Lucy! Look out, for goodness' sake. You're right on the edge of the gorge. Come back - " and then, a moment later, Edmunds voice saying "No, she's right. There is a way down."
The passage where Aslan leads the Children along the side of the gorge and finally to Aslan's How is beautiful. It's a lovely symbol of how God will lead us by the best path, even though to us it might seem treacherous. He knows the paths so much better than we do and it was only when the children trusted Aslan that they could find a way through.
This is summed up in Peter's confession: "I've been leading them wrong ever since we started and especially yesterday morning." I love that Aslan doesn't chastise him. He accepts Peter's confession with the loving words "My dear son."
I don't know how many of you have read Lewis' A Pilgrim's Regress. It's a rather difficult book because unlike The Chronicles it really is an allegory and the symbolism is difficult. (Lewis confesses in the preface to the version I have that he hadn't realised not everyone had the same journey to Christianity as him and he assumed that people would understand his symbolism more easily). Anyway, in the story, the protagonist, John, comes to a huge canyon which he cannot cross and much of the book is about him trying different ways to get across it and failing till he eventually realises that he cannot do it on his own. The first time I read it, I remember thinking how it was a bit like this part of Prince Caspian. Pilgrim's Regress was published in 1933, long before PC, but I think perhaps Lewis was trying to reuse the same allegory in a simpler form here.
Chapter 11.2: Bacchus
I've shared some of this before (we had a thread on the old forum about it) but some of you won't have seen that discussion so I thought I'd share it again. I always found the passage with Bacchus really odd. When I was doing my undergrad in classics, we did a section on Dionysus (the more common Greek name for the same god - we even studied a Greek play called The Bacchae) and I was even more confused. Bacchus was the god of wine and revelry and, from a Christian perspective, represents some of the greatest debauchery of Greek paganism. I remember learning about Silenus and the Maenads too, which was cool because now I knew who they were. But I did find their whole inclusion really odd. (As an aside, I also remember when I was doing first year Greek and, in our text book, the characters all go to a festival of Dionysus and there's this bit in the passage where the revellers shout: "eleleu, iou, iou!" which was glossed as "untranslatable ritual chants" and I remember thinking "Ooh! that's where Lewis got that from!" He has a slightly different version, but it's similar enough, that I'm sure they're both associated with the festival chants). What really confused me was what on earth these characters were doing in a Christian book? Then, one day I was reading LWW and saw something I had never noticed before, which suddenly made a bit more sense of the whole thing.
When Lucy realises here who the strange wild people are, she says to Susan, "Don't you remember Mr Tumnus telling us about them long ago?" Obviously, these conversations must have happened after the coronation for Susan to have heard them, but that wasn't the first time Tumnus told Lucy about them. On Lucy's first visit to Narnia, Mr Tumnus tells her about the good old days, before the White Witch, when they would have midnight dances and hunting parties and feasts and treasure hunts. He also tells her "about summer when the woods were green and old Silenus on his fat donkey would come to visit them, and sometimes Bacchus himself, and then the streams would run with wine instead of water and the whole forest would give itself up to jollification for weeks on end." He ends his tale with the sad line, "Not that it isn't always winter now."
When I discovered this passage, I suddenly felt like I understood a bit better what was going on in PC. The mention of Bacchus and Silenus in LWW might have just been a throw-away sentence. Fauns are closely associated with Bacchus in Greek mythology, so it makes sense that Mr Tumnus would mention their presence as representing the good old days of Narnia (days that no longer came now that the Witch made it eternal winter). Bacchus and Silenus belonged to a time before the Golden Age and before the White Witch's reign. In a way it symbolised the wild part of Narnia (the animals and mythical creatures) in their element. Lewis, for some reason, decides to harken back to this mention by Tumnus in the next book (remembering PC was published next after LWW). In the same way that the appearance of Father Christmas marked the Witch losing her power in LWW, so Bacchus' return here was a sign to the Old Narnians that things were being made right again. You might ask why Bacchus only returns now, and not during the Golden Age, and I don't really know the answer, but it seems rather fitting to have him appear here where the focus is on liberating the Old Narnians from repressive Telmarine rule.
One of the things Lewis seems to do with the Greek (and other) mythologies in Narnia, is "redeem" them. He was of the opinion that mythologies were based on partial truths that had been distorted. The Christian story was the "true myth". So he takes these pagan characters and creatures and puts them into a Christian setting. Bacchus and the maenads are no longer the decadent characters of Greek myth but something positive. They had been associated with drinking and drunkenness, but here they are associated with fruitfulness and plenty, making vines grow and allowing nature to reclaim what was taken from it. Instead of being associated with violence, they are simply wild (untamed). They are rather startling to Lucy and Susan who come from a world of order and a controlled society, but they are not bad. Also Aslan, is there to keep them safe (which is interesting, since he himself is "not a tame lion" - but in his untameness he is good and the girls know that).
I'd love to know what versions of the myths of Dionysus Lewis was familiar with. Were there stories he read as a child which already partially redeemed or put Bacchus, Silenus and the Maenads into a "safer" setting? How did he encounter them in school (school syllabuses in those days had far more inclusion of Classical literature and languages than they do now)? Or did he simply know about them from the days of his Classics degree? Whether it was from his own background or his own decision, it seems that Lewis' point here is to put mythical and pagan characters into a safer setting, at the same time elaborating on Mr Tumnus' passing comment about them in LWW.
Chapter 12: Nikabrik's Lies
I've noticed before that there are a few passages in The Chronicles where one of the bad characters tries to fool the heroes by cleverly formulated lies. They mix in enough truth to make it seem believable but then twist that truth. Lewis seems to have been strongly aware of how this kind of deception works and portraying examples of it. We see this best in Screwtape Letters where the demons describe how to trick humans. We also see it in the LotGK's speech about there being no such thing as overland or the sun in SC, in the way Shift tricks Puzzle into wearing the Lionskin (and in Shift's speeches on Stable Hill) in TLB and in the lies about Aslan as an evil lion that had developed in Calormen in HHB. Here, Nikabrik twists the truth by trying to make the others doubt what they knew about both the White Witch and Aslan.
That we should no longer be children, tossed about to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting (Eph 4:14)
But evil men and imposters will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you learned them. (2 Tim 3:13-14)