Comments | elizabeth_hoot: I need a Narnia icon

elizabeth_hoot

I need a Narnia icon

Jan 28, 2011 22:47

But for that, I'd want a The Horse and His Boy adaptation, and I don't know how they'd make it less than horrifically offensive.

Anyway. Awhile back, I rewatched Prince Caspian -- look, I don't know why I do these things to myself, except that I love Edmund and ninja!Edmund makes me happy. Seriously, it's like a bunch of people realised that he' ( Read more... )

character: cor, fandom: narnia, character: aravis, character: edmund pevensie, fandom: fandom, genre: meta

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moonspinner January 29 2011, 14:31:50 UTC

Fellow shipper here! I love them so hard. :D I think they were my first OTP ever.

ETA: 'Cos I actually have an OTP icon and I didn't have to wait for Disney's creeptastic movie to get one. :P

elizabeth_hoot January 30 2011, 00:29:00 UTC

THERE IS ANOTHER.

No, really, it's awesome that somebody else gets this. Cor is adorable and Aravis is adorable (also, they're kickass) and they're even better together. And if you're going to sum up a length Slap Slap Kiss Will They/Won't They courtship in a single sentence, that's the way to do it.

Also, I kind of love that, racist as just about every page might be, it ends with an interracial couple and cheerfully informs us that their biracial son is the BEST KING EVAR, without making a big deal out of any of these things. (Especially if Aravis really is descended from Tash.)

Also also, your icon is awesome. (Where did you find the picture? I've only found a handful of Cor or Aravis art at all.)

moonspinner January 30 2011, 10:33:04 UTC

And if you're going to sum up a length Slap Slap Kiss Will They/Won't They courtship in a single sentence, that's the way to do it.
I still remember shipping them so hard when I read the books for the first time (I was 12 going on 13 I think) and squealing with surprise and joy that they hooked up at the end. Funnily, Aravis’s role in the story is one of the things that makes the book not racist, at least to me. In fact compared to a lot of contemporary work *cough* Potter *cough*, The Horse and His Boy is actually very progressive. Which you can read as either a very good thing on Lewis’s part or very bad thing on the part of writers these days… (If the movie ever gets greenlighted, I am willing to bet good money that Aravis will be played by a White girl.)

elizabeth_hoot February 1 2011, 16:07:30 UTC

Hm, I don't know. I mean, if I give it points for progressive things and take away points for prejudiced things, the sheer awesome of Aravis might very well cancel out the casual racism. But I don't think it really works like that, so IMO HHB is both racist and progressive.

I may like HP more than you do (I have EPIC ISSUES with the last two, but it's like SW -- I can hate three quarters of the franchise and still love it), so I'm not sure if I see it as overall less progressive than Narnia. Some ways yes, some ways no.

Oh Lord, if Aravis is played by a white girl -- GAAAAAAAH. It wouldn't even make sense! But I can see it happening -- I can even say them taking the whole Arabian Night flavour out of it. Eurgh.

moonspinner February 1 2011, 17:38:47 UTC

Hmmm… this might get pretty long because it’s something I’ve given a lot of thought to before but never been able to express coherently ( ... )

elizabeth_hoot February 4 2011, 22:11:20 UTC

Well, I do agree that making a character like Aravis one of the protagonists would be progressive even now, never mind in 1955 or whenever (both on the racism/feminism side of things). I think it especially works because she's not a Magical Minority character who exists to back up the white hero, but is at once heroic, flawed, complex, and completely hardcore in her own right.

Similarly, I think it's admirable that even the mass of Calormene villains are carefully differentiated. Even in a single scene, the Vizier and the Tisroc and Rabadash come across as completely different people with only somewhat similar goals and motivations.

So I'm not disputing that there are things in HHB that are actually really good, race-wise, and I suspect that's why it bothers me less than many other people. I still think it's problematic that the vast majority of Narnia's POC are villains and HHB's villains are nearly all POC, but actually, I have a much bigger problem with the casual descriptions ( ... )

moonspinner February 5 2011, 12:56:43 UTC

I have a much bigger problem with the casual descriptions.

Awhile back, I read HHB aloud to my mother. It was fun, mostly, but there were so many lines constantly associating beauty with whiteness that it was almost painful to say them.Well, it sounds bad… until you put it in context. If you critique the moments that the Northerner’s physical beauty is referred to, you’ll notice a pattern. Shasta is referred to as ‘white and beautiful’, not by the narrative voice or even by Bree or the Narnians but by a man who wants to buy him for a.fate.worse.than.death (according to Bree)? Susan is described as the same by Rabadash. Lastly, Las says that ‘some’ of the Narnia men. It seems like the two people who seem to correlate beauty and whiteness are the people who have a particular interest one white and beautiful person. And Las makes her comment in the same breath that she describes Ahosta as just ‘dahling’ (you just know that she talks like that :P ( ... )

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