Comments | delta_mai: Women in Narnia essay.

delta_mai

Women in Narnia essay.

Feb 18, 2011 17:33

So finally my essay is done! It's 1,451 words and examines the role of women in Narnia. Susan's a pretty big focus if you're interested. Hopefully it'll be published, but it's between this essay and one by someone else so fingers crossed! In any case, here it is.

Women in Narnia:
The good, the bad and the demonised. At first glance, the Narnia ( Read more... )

susan is a secular humanist, real life, fic challenge: women in narnia, journalism, feminism, meta rambles, essays, susan rules, drama society, hullfire, susan is a rebel, articles, narnia

Comments 8

snacky February 18 2011, 19:57:55 UTC

Good work! :D

delta_mai February 18 2011, 23:38:23 UTC

Thanks :) I ended up agreeing with you about Susan - she's not portrayed that well as an adult queen either. And she's not really portrayed positively anywhere else - in Prince Caspian her siblings are horrible to her when she's just being sensible :( Poot thing.

delta_mai February 18 2011, 23:38:38 UTC

But did you think I covered everything? :)

sherrilina February 20 2011, 20:38:12 UTC

Great meta essay, some very interesting points, and well supported with some nicely chosen quotes and such! I really need to reread these books/finish the series (I stopped part-way through The Silver Chair b/c I lost the book, and then didn't feel motivated to finish when I did buy another copy at last because it had been boring thus far). All I remember about The Horse and His Boy is that I really liked it/it was my fave of the series, and there was a scene with him and Aslan and he had a horse and was secretly royal or something. IDK. I also loved "The Magician's Nephew" which I read first according to a printing ordered in chronological order rather than printing order.

delta_mai February 21 2011, 18:41:47 UTC

Thanks! It was hard to write but I think I got all the points in I wanted :D
Omg you have to finish Silver Chair - it's the best. Horse and His Boy is my joint favourite though - it's so exciting! Excellent - you like the same ones I do :D Magician's Nephew is good too, and I always read them in chronological order as opposed to printing order (which is totally fucked up).
You should re-read in light of adult knowledge. Makes them far more interesting, and in some ways disturbing. As well as all of the anti-feminist stuff I mentioned, there's also the inherent racism and blatant Christian propoganda. They are good books but I think they should be approached with caution.

femme_slash_fan February 23 2011, 16:14:35 UTC

I still don't like that he seems to have Susan give up on Narnia, I doubt she ever really lost faith, she probably just chose to live as an adult and by calling it a 'game' she's trying to remind herself she has to stay focused on what she's doing now.

I got so angry when Susan didn't come back at the end... I mean Peter's what? A year younger so the ban shouldn't count really. (It's been ages since I read these but I think Pete came back?)

delta_mai February 23 2011, 16:21:14 UTC

That's a totally valid interpretation. The fact is that it's never really explained. She seems to have been rejected on the basis of her character - she's described as vain, superficial, potentially secular... Basically Lewis has the characters bad mouth her.

The ages don't count - they all return as adults. Even Jill and Eustace, who were children in the chapter before...

femme_slash_fan February 23 2011, 19:19:10 UTC

Oh yeah, that's true about the ages... I literally just re-skimmed the book.

Lewis made her out as such a fool at the end, I think that's why I have what I like to call 'My Susan' aka the Susan who knew she had to stay, even if she really wanted Narnia.

Lewis made a boo-boo basically.