If you have poked around the blog here at all, you’ll undoubtedly have noticed that I’ve got a bit of a theme going as we head towards winter solstice and Advent. Light and darkness, darkness and light, the physical and literal, the spiritual and metaphorical meanings of the two, keep running around and together in my mind. It’s something I find myself contemplating every year at this time, but am especially preoccupied with in the midst of our current notable historical moment.
So I thought I’d write about books that served as light in darkness to me when I was a child, and about how they continue to shed light, in spite of their flaws. (If you want an unpacking of those flaws, this is not where it’s going to happen–I want to be up front about understanding my favorites have shortcomings, but if you’re looking for more than that at the moment, you’ll have to utilize your Google skills.)
Now that’s out of the way, let’s talk about wardrobes and witches and lions and faith.
I don’t remember the first time I read the Narnia series. With other books, I have a definitive Moment of Discovery, but Narnia was always there, part of the background of my childhood. Likely, my mother read them to me before I could read myself. Presumably, I went on to read them on my own in first or second grade, as I did with all my favorite read alouds. But as far as memory serves, Aslan and the Pevensies and Eustace and Jill, Diggory and Polly and the many wonderful people of Narnia, were always there.
I do remember what struck me most strongly about the books, though, both as a child and a young person and an adult. It was, and is, the fierceness of the characters’ faith. Growing up in the Christian church, I learned by heart (at yet another dim, unremembered point) that “faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” And the faith of the people of Narnia, and of Narnia’s friends from our world, shone bright as the sun.
Lucy Pevensie, the darling of the series, is a goodhearted and compassionate and unimpeachably truthful girl. She’s also the first to demonstrate the series’ hallmark virtue. After visiting Narnia through the iconic wardrobe, she’s immediately (and understandably) misbelieved by her siblings. It would be easy for any of us, under those circumstances, to doubt. To question our own experiences, or recant for the sake of convenience and peace.
Lucy, however, does none of those things. Instead, she stays faithful regardless of the cost.
For the next few days she was very miserable. She could have made it up with the others quite easily at any moment if she could have brought herself to say that the whole thing was only a story made up for fun. But Lucy was a very truthful girl and she knew that she was really in the right; and she could not bring herself to say this. The others who thought she was telling a lie, and a silly lie too, made her very unhappy.
~The Lion, The Witch and the wardrobe
Later on in the same story, we see faith exhibited by the beleaguered people of Narnia. Subjugated by a White Witch and cursed to endure the well known “always winter but never Christmas” (a sort of eternal January through March doldrums) the residents of Narnia have passed on, for a century, memories of their world before. Of “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.”
It is not only memories of the old times the Narnians have passed down either–throughout the Witch’s reign, they remain steadfastly faithful that an end will come to her tyranny. That
Wrong will be right, when Aslan comes in sight,
~The Lion, the witch, and the wardrobe
At the sound of his roar, sorrows will be no more,
When he bares his teeth, winter meets its death,
And when he shakes his mane, we shall have spring again.
As we know, the faith of the Narnians is well-rewarded.
But the vital moments of Lucy’s discovery of Narnia and Aslan’s salvation of his kingdom are not the only instances of Narnian faith. It characterizes them throughout the series–Shasta believes in the talking horse, Bree’s, assurance that their journey across a desert will lead to greater happiness. Caspian believes that the crew of his ship, the Dawn Treader, will find not just the seven missing lords of his father’s court, but also high adventure and lands beyond the known bounds of the world. Reepicheep, most valiant of all Narnians, sails past the world’s very ending, unshakeable in his belief that such an act of daring will lead not to his destruction, but to the discovery of Aslan’s Country.
The most stirring exhibit of faith in the Chronicles of Narnia, though, occurs in The Silver Chair, one of the odder installments of the series. In it, Eustace Scrubb and Jill, children from our world, along with two companions–doleful Puddleglum and the ensorcelled Prince Rilian–are imprisoned in the underground domain of yet another Witch. There, the Witch lays a spell of music and fire upon them, designed to make them forget the world above entirely. But the faith of Narnians–even the humblest and most ordinary among them–is a hard thing to contend with.
“There never was such a world,” said the Witch.
“No,” said Jill and Scrubb, “never was such a world.”
“There never was any world but mine,” said the Witch.
“There never was any world but yours,” said they.
Puddleglum was still fighting hard. “I don’t rightly know what you all mean by a world,” he said, talking like a man who hasn’t enough air. “But you can play that fiddle till your fingers drop off, and still you won’t make me forget Narnia; and the whole Overworld too. We’ll never see it again, I shouldn’t wonder. You may have blotted it out and turned it dark like this, for all I know. Nothing more likely. But I know I was there once. I’ve seen the sky full of stars. I’ve seen the sun coming up out of the sea of a morning and sinking behind the mountains at night. And I’ve seen him up in the midday sky when I couldn’t look at him for brightness.”
…”Your sun is a dream; and there is nothing in that dream that was not copied from the lamp. The lamp is the real thing; the sun is but a tale, a children’s story.”
“Yes, I see now,” said Jill in a heavy, hopeless tone. “It must be so.” And while she said this, it seemed to her to be very good sense.
Slowly and gravely the Witch repeated, “There is no sun.” And they all said nothing. She repeated, in a softer and deeper voice. “There is no sun.” After a pause, and after a struggle in their minds, all four of them said together, “You are right. There is no sun.” It was such a relief to give in and say it.
…”Come, all of you,” (said the Witch.) “Put away these childish tricks. I have work for you all in the real world. There is no Narnia, no Overworld, no sky, no sun, no Aslan. And now, to bed all. And let us begin a wiser life tomorrow…”
The Prince and the two children were standing with their heads hung down, their cheeks flushed, their eyes half closed; the strength had all gone from them; the enchantment almost complete. But Puddleglum, desperately gathering all his strength, walked over to the fire. Then he did a very brave thing. He knew it wouldn’t hurt him quite as much as it would hurt a human; for his feet (which were bare) were webbed and hard and cold-blooded like a duck’s. But he knew it would hurt him badly enough; and so it did. With his bare foot he stamped on the fire, grinding a large part of it into ashes on the flat hearth…
…The sweet, heavy smell grew very much less. For though the whole fire had not been put out, a good bit of it had, and what remained smelled very largely of burnt Marsh-wiggle, which is not at all an enchanting smell. This instantly made everyone’s brain far clearer. The Prince and the children held up their heads again and opened their eyes…
“One word, Ma’am,” he (Puddleglum) said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. “One word. All you’ve been saying is quite right, I shouldn’t wonder. I’m a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won’t deny any of what you said. But there’s one thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things–trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that’s a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We’re just babies making up a game, if you’re right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That’s why I’m going to stand by the play-world. I’m on Aslan’s side even if there isn’t any Aslan to lead it. I’m going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn’t any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we’re leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that’s small loss if the world’s as dull a place as you say.”
~The Silver Chair
Puddleglum’s demonstration of faith and determination is an extraordinary one, made all the more so by his temperament, which tends to melancholy and pessimism. But at his core, there is a staunch belief in the good and bright realm he’s come from, and a refusal to settle for less. He will accept no pale and hollow imitation of the real world, so long as even the idea of another and better reality remains. It is his relentless faith that overcomes the Witch’s insidious spell.
So what about us? Most of us have done our share of knocking on the backs of wardrobes, wishing for another world. Some of us have, despite the disappointing emptiness of cupboards and closets, retained faith in the existence of another world, someday, somehow. Some of us have lost that faith. But we all believe in something, and it’s not solely a religious concept, faith.
During high school, I had the privilege of taking a philosophy class taught by my school’s cleverest and most demanding teacher. He introduced us to Descartes’ cogito ergo sum–I think, therefore I am, the one and only premise that philosophy has ever been able to definitively prove. Because I think, I know I must exist somewhere, in some form. Everything else, my philosophy teacher informed the classroom of alternately bored or riveted students, is a matter of basic belief.
Of faith.
Philosophically, the very world we treat as undeniable, and the input of our senses, are all basic beliefs. All matters of faith. We have faith that what we perceive is real. We have faith that the world will continue to turn just as it has always done, and, on an even more basic level, that our world exists at all.
Faith underpins everything we do, whether we recognize it or not.
I see, all around me, a pale and hollow world, shot through with threads of glory. It is Narnia in winter–at once the memory of something better and the potential for greater things. Perhaps my vision is skewed. Perhaps my faith is misplaced. Perhaps we are little better than animals, and my beliefs that “all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well,” and that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice” will ultimately be proved foolish.
The truth is, I don’t much care. I’m going to stand by the play-world. I’m on Aslan’s side even if there isn’t any Aslan to lead it. I’m going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn’t any Narnia. And I plan to spend my life not just looking for Overland–for a better and brighter and more just world. However I can, whenever it lies within my power, I will work to begin bringing that brighter world about.
Because true faith is not just a matter of nebulous belief. True faith acts, like Puddleglum the Marsh-wiggle. True faith carries on, like Caspian and Reepicheep. True faith persists in the face of doubt, like Lucy Pevensie. And true faith–in our capacity to do better and be better, and in a brighter world–well. That sort of faith builds. With words or paint or laws or lessons taught or kindness given, assistance offered. That faith cannot stay idle; it is the occupation of a lifetime.
I hope to spend my life working faithfully. I hope to do so alongside you.
Sending you all love and light as the days grow darker,
Laura
