Through the Wardrobe

by Herbie Brennan

  Actually, they did, and could. As the years went by, my childhood friends and I all noticed the waning of the wildlife. Thirty years later, that holding basin still exists, but it’s now almost completely devoid of life, a slimy, silent place with a foul smell. Just like the world of magic and the world of the ordinary cannot coexist, apparently wilderness and civilization can’t coexist for long, either. Even that little patch of Eden was too much for most to bear.

  All these hidden animals my friends and I were finding at the time? They definitely weren’t “ordinary,” but they weren’t The People Who Lived in Hiding, either. If they were too magical for the neighbors with perfectly manicured lawns, they weren’t magical enough for me. I wanted Dwarfs and Fairies and Dryads and Centaurs. Like Caspian, I wanted my animals to talk!

  So I kept looking. Like Doctor Cornelius, I often saw glimpses of things that looked promising. Once I saw a strange orange light flickering just over the horizon. I walked for an hour only to discover that it was merely the burning off of methane from a nearby garbage dump.

  I didn’t give up. I kept searching. Magic—I was determined to find it!

  And eventually I did.

  It’s true that the castles and magical creatures in Prince Caspian’s Narnia are hidden from view, but the biggest obstacles to seeing them aren’t the brambles that grew up around them or the mountain trees that obscured them. They’re the observer’s own self-limitations, their inability to see beyond the ordinary.

  In other words, seeing hidden things is mostly a question of perception.

  We see the first example of this when the Pevensies are sorting out the secret of Cair Paravel. “It’s about time we four starting using our brains,” Peter says. And Lucy, keenly attuned to the world of magic, answers, “I’ve felt for hours that there was some wonderful mystery hanging over this place.”

  Then Peter lays out the pieces of the puzzle: the orchard planted by Lilygloves the Mole, the size and shape of the ruined hall, the chess piece, and—the final confirmation—the door to the treasure room, exactly where it should be, though covered by a curtain of ivy.

  This isn’t a forgotten castle, at least not anymore; now its identity is obvious. The Pevensies merely needed to change their perspectives—a change that comes for all of them in a moment of gestalt, that time of sudden realization when all the little details of something come together into a unified whole, and a person sees “the big picture” for the first time.

  When Doctor Cornelius tells Caspian of Old Narnia, the prince has his own moment of gestalt: All at once Caspian realized the truth and felt that he ought to have realized it long before. Doctor Cornelius was so small, and so fat, and had such a very long beard. Two thoughts came into his head at the same moment. One was a thought of terror—“He’s not a real man, he’s a Dwarf, and he’s brought me up here to kill me.” The other was sheer delight—“There are real Dwarfs still, and I’ve seen one at last.”

  When it comes to magical creatures in hiding, there was one hiding right in front of Caspian all along. But until Caspian changed his perspective, he had no chance of seeing him.

  Magic, it seems, is sometimes hard to see, even in Narnia. Indeed, when extraordinary (but hidden) things are finally revealed, there will always be those who simply choose not to see them, or who are unable to handle their existence. According to Lewis, that might even be most humans. Right before the final defeat of the Telmarines by Old Narnia, Aslan travels the land restoring its magic and beauty. This presents a problem for Miss Prizzle, the Telmarine schoolmarm whose classroom has suddenly been transformed into a forest:Miss Prizzle found she was standing on grass in a forest glade. She clutched at her desk to steady herself, and found that the desk was a rose-bush. Wild people such as she had never even imagined were crowding round her. Then she saw the Lion, screamed and fled, and with her fled her class, who were mostly dumpy, prim little girls with fat legs.

  Miss Prizzle had never even imagined such creatures? Well, that’s her problem right there; to paraphrase Yoda, that is why she fails. If there’s never been any room in her world-view for the extraordinary, if she can’t even imagine them, why would she be able to perceive them when confronted by them in real life?

  And then there’s the curious question of seeing Aslan himself, the most magical of all Narnia’s creatures, but also—at least at times—one of its best hidden.

  When the Pevensies and Trumpkin travel from Cair Paravel to join Caspian at Aslan’s How, they’re not sure of the quickest path, and Aslan appears to lead the way. Naturally, Lucy, with her wide-open mind, is quick to spot him.

  But the others don’t see, and—except for Edmund—they don’t believe that Lucy does either. After a vote, they choose not to follow Aslan’s lead. Before long, they naturally find themselves at a dead end.

  That night, Lucy wakes to find that not only can she see Aslan, she can see the sleeping spirits of the Narnian trees waking at last. Aslan directs her to get the others, which she tries to do; Edmund is the only sibling she’s able to wake, and he’s still unable to see Aslan. “There’s nothing there,” he says to Lucy. “You’ve got dazzled and muddled with the moonlight. One does, you know. I thought I saw something for a moment myself. It’s only an optical what-do-you-call-it.”

  Edmund isn’t able to see the Lion because he hasn’t yet had a change in perception, the Aslan-related moment of gestalt.

  Edmund does see him eventually—first Aslan’s shadow, then the Lion himself. Shortly thereafter, Peter sees him too.

  Close-minded Susan, the one who spitefully encourages the others to ignore Lucy’s pleadings, is the last Pevensie to be able to see Aslan. But finally even she sees what was so obvious to Lucy all along. She apologizes to Lucy for not believing her, saying, “But I’ve been far worse than you know. I really believed it was him—he, I mean . . . I mean, deep down inside. Or I could have, if I’d let myself.”

  Susan could have seen the Lion if she’d let herself—if she’d previously exercised the muscles of her imagination, and if she’d opened her mind enough to consider the possibility of the unexpected.

  Problem is, she didn’t.

  What magic did I find in that little forest by the house of my suburban childhood? Like the Pevensies and the ruins of Cair Paravel, and like Prince Caspian and Doctor Cornelius, it wasn’t anything that hadn’t been right in front of me all along.

  I just needed a change in my perspective.

  For example, one afternoon my friends and I put on our boots and headed out across Mud Island, this flat expanse of mud in the middle of the swamp. But the mud was deeper than we’d expected, and I’d barely gotten five feet when my walking stick got stuck in the muck (not to mention my boots). I had no choice but to leave the stick behind (not to mention my boots). My walking stick remained there, standing upright in the mud.

  A few weeks later, I noticed leaves sprouting from the top of that stick. It had taken root in the rich, wet muck of Mud Island.

  By the following year it had turned into a small tree. I proudly watched that tree grow for the rest of my childhood. Before long, it was a massive alder that towered over the whole island.

  Okay, so it wasn’t exactly a toffee tree growing from a piece of candy, or a lamppost taking root in the ground. But, hey, toffee trees don’t grow even in Narnia, not after the first few days of its existence, after Aslan’s initial burst of creation magic fades. That tree I inadvertently planted on Mud Island was pretty magical.

  As for animals that talk, I once spent half an hour watching a family of foxes in that forest. Initially, they were frightened of me. But when it became clear that I was no danger, that I was merely sitting in the grass and watching from afar, they began to relax. The kits began to play with each other while the mother kept a wary eye on me. Don’t tell me she wasn’t communicating to me loudly and clearly.

  And what of the river gods and Dryads and the rest of the forest spirits? Well, I’ve still never actually seen one, but I
’ve definitely felt something in those woods. When the day comes that we learn trees have an intelligence of sorts, I won’t be surprised in the least.

  So magic is hidden all around us, visible if we’re simply willing to open our eyes? And the line between imagination and reality isn’t nearly as strong as some would like us to believe? Is that what I’m saying?

  Well, yes, that’s pretty much it. But it’s not just me. I happen to think it’s exactly what C. S. Lewis was saying with the entire Chronicles of Narnia series, and I think he came out and said it most directly in Prince Caspian.

  Oh, not that trite old insight! you might be saying. That’s not real magic! That’s not the way it is for the Pevensies when they go to Narnia or for Caspian and Doctor Cornelius when they go searching for the People Who Live in Hiding! They find the real thing! The kind of magic you’re talking about only exists in your imagination.

  Have it your way. But for the record? That’s exactly what Susan and Miss Prizzle would say.

  Brent Hartinger is a four-time Book Sense Pick and the author of many novels for young people, including Geography Club and his latest, Shadow Walkers, about astral projecting teens (coming in Winter 2011). Brent also edits the fantasy-themed website TheTorchOnline.com. Learn more at www.brenthartinger.com.

  You know what they say: nice girls always seem to fall for the bad boys. But Diana Peterfreund explains how her crush on bad boy Edmund only really started when he began to see the error of his ways, and takes us on an extensive journey through the Chronicles of Narnia to illustrate the point that pure goodness can be . . . well . . . intimidating.

  King Edmund the Cute

  Anatomy of a Girlhood Crush

  DIANA PETERFREUND

  Let’s get it straight: I wasn’t sitting around writing “Diana Hearts Edmund” in my Trapper Keeper, but I had an enormous crush on Edmund Pevensie when I was a kid. When I admit that to people, then and now, I invariably get a reaction that’s halfway between bemused and appalled. Edmund? they say. Isn’t he the petulant, whiny traitor responsible for Aslan’s death?

  Yes, yes he is. In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. But that’s only the start of Edmund’s adventures in Narnia. He pulls it together by the end of that book and proceeds to rock out for four more. No, Ed doesn’t leave us with the best first impression in all of literature, but he more than makes up for it in the rest of the series.

  If anything, his experiences in the first book 2 give him a breadth of knowledge and depth of experience and sorrow that surpass that of all the other children who become “friends of Narnia.” C. S. Lewis wants Edmund to be one of the noblest characters in the series (barring Reepicheep, whom Lewis set up for sainthood from word one). He wants to show no mistake was too dire that you couldn’t rise above it. And Edmund not only rises, he kicks butt . . . and I swoon.

  But not at first.

  When we meet Edmund, he’s a cranky, spiteful little turd. His first act as a character is to ridicule his adorable kid sister about her Narnian “fantasies.” Within a few pages, he’s colluding with the White Witch in exchange for bon bons. Soon after, when Edmund lies to his siblings about visiting Narnia, Lewis describes it as “one of the nastiest things in this story.” The death and dismemberment and turning of folks into stone? All pretty bad, but Edmund lying to his family and casting his lot with the Witch is the true betrayal here. When they speak of Edmund being a traitor, this is what they are talking about. He didn’t turn against the Narnians, who were not—yet—his countrymen; he sold out his brother and sisters to the White Witch. He’s already so far gone that by the time he hears Aslan’s name for the first time, from Mr. Beaver, he does not experience the delicious sensation the other children do. Instead, he feels only “mysterious horror.”

  Edmund’s comeuppance arrives swiftly. He’s barely at the Witch’s castle before she shows her true colors, and his envy toward Peter begins to fade as he recognizes that maybe he was letting his bad attitude blind him toward the truth about that chick with the Turkish Delight and the wand. Edmund’s turning point comes when the Witch takes out her frustration on a family of squirrels and he begs for their lives. She beats him, then says, “let that teach you to ask favor for spies and traitors,” a statement that foreshadows her triumph when Aslan does the same on Edmund’s behalf later on. Edmund’s redemption has begun, however, for though he is half-frozen, starving, and lying in a bloody huddle at the back of the Witch’s sledge, he, “for the first time in this story, felt sorry for someone besides himself.”

  Why I Heart Edmund

  After Edmund admits his mistake, it’s nothing but love, baby. When he is rescued from the Witch’s clutches, the first thing that happens is a long and private (even from the reader) conversation with Aslan. It is one that Edmund never forgets, and it informs his character from that point on.

  Later, he attempts to stop Aslan from striking the bargain with the White Witch, not knowing, as the Lion does, of the deeper magic that will ultimately redeem him. But more than anything, he saves all of Narnia in the final battle because Edmund alone figures out that the best way to defeat the Witch is to destroy the wand she’s been using to turn her attackers into stone. When Lucy looks at him after the battle, she sees that the scars he’s suffered at his “horrid” boarding school “where he had begun to go wrong” (all the Chronicles are concerned with the type of emotional abuse children receive at school) have faded away, and Edmund has “become his real old self again.”

  And he just gets better with age: “Edmund was a graver and quieter man than Peter, and great in council and judgment.” It is this description of the adult King Edmund that abides throughout the rest of the series. Even when Edmund is once more transformed into a child, he remains a wise, thoughtful leader, and a shrewd and clever advisor. It is Edmund who comes up with the lion’s share of plans in Prince Caspian: Edmund who first realizes how time moves differently in Narnia than in our world, Edmund who suggests dueling with the Dwarf Trumpkin to prove that they are worthy allies and Narnian royalty, and Edmund who devises the plan to meet Caspian at Aslan’s How.

  Nevertheless, he remembers his past and remains humbled by the experience. Though Lucy is the only one to see Aslan while they travel through the wilderness, Edmund still votes to follow her lead.

  When we first discovered Narnia a year ago—or a thousand years ago, whichever it was—it was Lucy who discovered it first and none of us would believe her. I was the worst of the lot, I know. Yet she was right after all. Wouldn’t it be fair to believe her this time?

  It was at that moment that I fell for Edmund, and fell hard, because, as all storytellers know, there is nothing more appealing than a bad guy gone good. Edmund knows where he’s been, realizes how close he came to ruin, and wants above all to be worthy of the faith that Aslan and the Narnians have in him.

  By the time Peter is writing the letter to Miraz, which describes his brother’s full title: “. . . our well-beloved and royal brother Edmund, sometime King under us in Narnia, Duke of Lantern Waste and Count of the Western March, Knight of the Noble Order of the Table,”3 my ten-year-old self was well and truly gone. (If I didn’t write Countess of the Western March on my Trapper Keeper once or twice, I should have, because that’s a very cool title to hold.) Edmund was my favorite character in the series (except for Reepicheep, as already stated, but he was a Mouse—can’t have a literary crush on a Mouse).

  Since the Narnian stories are, at their heart, redemption stories, Lewis includes in each a character whose fate it is to be redeemed by Narnian values, adventures, and faith. In Prince Caspian, the “cranky” and “disbeliever” mantles worn by Edmund in the first book are passed on to his sister Susan and Trumpkin, respectively. (Both, of course, get over it by the end of the book.) In the third book, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Lewis outdoes himself with the introduction of Eustace Clarence Scrubb.

  Eustace, a cousin to the Pevensies, whines his way through the first half of the book. Like Edmu
nd in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, he is suspicious and jealous of his companions, greedy for power and wealth, and cranky and selfish at every opportunity. But before he has the chance to cause any real damage, he’s turned into a dragon. After Aslan feels the little snot has learned his lesson, he is restored to human form, and like Edmund, becomes a changed man. Naturally, the first person the penitent Eustace runs into is our darling Edmund, who alone among the denizens of the Dawn Treader can understand what it means to have your world rocked, Aslan-style. As he tells his cousin the story of his transformation and recovery, Eustace is by turns humble, contrite, and humiliated. When he apologies, Edmund responds: “Between ourselves, you haven’t been as bad as I was on my first trip to Narnia. You were only an ass, but I was a traitor.”

  It’s an important reminder. Because Eustace’s beastliness goes on for the better half of the book—and is aimed against all of our old favorite characters: the Pevensies, Caspian, and darling, noble Reepicheep—we might forget that Edmund was way, way worse in his time. Remember how he was the reason Aslan died? Remember how he almost got his brother and sisters turned into stone? Huh? Remember?

  And yet, for some reason, we just don’t care. We’re too much in luuuv. No matter how many great things Eustace does in subsequent books, I never fell for him. Maybe the problem is that annoying doesn’t up your attractiveness quotient the same way evil does. Eustace was a pain in the butt, but Edmund was seriously dark. And every time he gets all noble and reminds us of his past, we love him even more for having the strength to overcome it.