@Ariel: It is interesting to wonder if growing up between two boys (and losing her mother) made Aravis less interested in "girl" things. My friend told me her daughter is turning out to be a bit of a tom-boy, possibly because she has a big brother she looks up to (she's not two yet).
@Swan: Thanks for sharing those lessons from crossing the desert.
Chapters 9-10
The desert passage (especially when they travel at night) always reminds me of my family's trip to Namibia in 2005 when we were running behind schedule and had to drive for what felt like forever in a barren landscape. There was this one point where we started to imagine trees lining the sides of the road as though we were approaching a town but they weren't there, it was just some optical illusion. It reminded us of the words in the song Blessed Be Your Name that say:
"Blessed be your name, when I'm found in the desert place, though I walk through the wilderness, blessed Be Your name."
I feel like these chapters are so full of really powerful lessons and symbolism though it's hard to sum them up. Let me try:
- Stories sometimes romanticise things in unrealistic ways: you can't "gallop for a day and night"
- Sometimes it looks like you aren't making progress when you are: Tashbaan refused to look any farther away (Swan mentioned that)
- Fairness doesn't always mean everyone being treated the same: "It's all right for you...you've got shoes on". (Some people have advantages that mean they don't need the concessions others do" Aravis' "looking prim" seems to be a subtle hint that she she takes too much pride in her advantage and is missing the point
- I can't decide if the scene where they all fall asleep and wake late is a chastisement (a bit reminiscent of Jesus' disciples sleeping when they are supposed to be praying in Gethsemane), or if it's a reminder that the body needs rest and sometimes you need to let it rest even if you feel like you should be doing something else.
- The people who think they know best aren't always right, and sometimes those with the best ideas are too shy to argue: Bree thinks that he knows a "little more about forced campaigns" and Hwin says nothing further since she's "a very nervous and gentle person" [I probably shouldn't but I kinda want to throw out the word "man-splain" here
]- After the desert comes the fertile valley (Swan touched on that too)
- You don't know how fast you can go (or how resilient you are) till you're pushed to your limits
- "if you do one good deed, your reward usually is to be set to do another and harder and better one"
- Sometimes you're not as great as you think. It depends who you're comparing yourself with. "As long as you know you're nobody special, you'll be a very decent sort of Horse"
On the last point, Bree reminds me a bit of Reepicheep. Worrying a little too much about his reputation or "honour" in a why that reveals pride rather than humility.
I end with this quote because the last part really struck me. Maybe I'm reading too much into it but:
"P-please," said Hwin, very shyly, "I feel just like Bree that I can't go on. But when horses have humans (with spurs and things) on their backs, aren't they often made to go on when they're feeling like this? And then they find we can I m-mean - oughtn't we to be able to do even more, now that we're free? It's for Narnia!
I know this is part of the "having more strength to do impossible tasks than we think we have until we are pushed to our limits. But I was also thinking about how, as Christians, once we're freed from things that were a burden (like the Law) we should actually be better at doing the things we struggled with before. We get this kind of teaching in some of Paul's letters and James, I think (can't think of specific verses off-hand). So although we live under grace and it's okay if we mess up or don't live perfect lives, we should actually be better and living good lives because we're doing it because we want to not because we have to. Not sure if that entirely makes sense, I'll read what I wrote again in the morning just to check :p
Oh, nearly forgot this. I asked AjjieSis to help me recreate a scene from the book while I was still at my parents' house. Since they have better options for "props" than I do, and she has lots of horse things. We chose the one of Aslan chasing the heroes to the Hermit's place. It's not very "actiony" and I could have posed it better but we didn't have a lot of time to spend on it. All the things were my sister's except the tree and the duplo lion (which is technically mine, I think, but our duplo all lives together).
- Hermit.jpg (57.59 KiB) Viewed 5013 times
(@Ajie , I hope you like the hedgehog 