Year: 2013

A visitor to this blog has suggested that I write the missing Narnia story.

First I would have to get permission from the estate of C.S. Lewis. I have no idea what would be the chances of that. Supposing I got it, I’d have a tremendously hard act to follow. There would be plenty of Narnia fans who wouldn’t be pleased no matter what I did.

Obviously the story would have to be about redemption–Queen Susan’s, and ultimately our own. As you’ll see when you read The Fugitive Prince, I’m not afraid to write about redemption. It’s an overarching theme of the whole Bell Mountain series. But I am afraid of trying to imitate C.S. Lewis, so I would have to write a Narnia story in my own way, without trying to imitate one of the least imitable writers I have ever read.

It doesn’t seem to me that Susan committed any gaudy, eye-popping sins. She just sort of drifted away from Aslan–as so many of us, at one time or another in our lives, just drift away from Christ. You don’t have to commit any big sins to do that; a lot of little ones will do as well. Individually, they might not even look like sins. Is there really anything all that sinful about “nylons and lipstick and invitations”? It would be easier to write the story if Susan became an adulteress, a counterfeiter, or an atheist. But I don’t think Lewis would have been interested in anything that obvious. No–this would have to be a story about being delivered from bondage to a lot of sneaky little sins that imperceptibly add up to the great sin of forgetfulness. Come to think of it, that’s the same sin committed by Obann as a nation in the Bell Mountain stories.

Regardless of whether I decide to stick to my own matter of Obann, etc., and not take up this challenge, I still think someone ought to do it. But I’ll think about it until, as Sir Bors once said, “a better knight shall come along to do this battle.”

 

 

I’ve mentioned before that there is one Narnia story that remains to be written. C.S. Lewis ought to have written it himself, and I think he would have, if he’d lived longer.

Narnia fans will remember that, in The Last Battle, all the children and adults who visited Narnia return as kings and queens. They’ve all come back to stay–all of them, that is, except for Susan. As Lewis wrote:

“…Has not your Majesty two sisters? Where is Queen Susan?”

“My sister Susan,” answered Peter shortly and gravely, “is no longer a friend of Narnia.”

“Yes,” said Eustace, “and whenever you’ve tried to get her to come and talk about Narnia or do anything about Narnia, she says, ‘What wonderful memories you have! Fancy you still thinking about all those funny games we used to play when we were children.'”

“Oh, Susan!” said Jill. “She’s interested in nothing nowadays except nylons and lipstick and invitations. She was always a jolly sight too keen on being grown-up.”

“Grown-up, indeed,” said the Lady Polly. “I wish she would grow up. She wasted all her school time wanting to be the age she is now, and she’ll waste all the rest of her life trying to stay that age…”

The odd thing about this conversation is that all the speakers are dead. They have passed on into the afterlife. So apparently Susan has not yet died, and is lost to Narnia forever.

But what did Aslan do to Susan, her brothers, and her sister in the first Narnia book, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe? He made them kings and queens of Narnia. And what did he say?

“Once a king or queen in Narnia, always a king or queen.”

To those who understand the stories, it’s inconceivable that Aslan could be wrong. That he could have made an error in judgment in making Susan a queen. That he could have said “always” when he really meant, “for a little while or so.”

To be sure, Susan has been sidetracked by the cares and seductions of her life in the “real” world.

And so the story that needs to be written is, How does she get back to Narnia? How does Aslan rescue and redeem her?

We have all gone astray, at one time or another in our lives. We have all kept the Good Shepherd busy. But if He means to save you, He will. Period.

I would very much like to know Susan’s story, after her brothers and sister have died and been brought back to live eternally in Aslan’s country (of which Narnia and England are but parts).

Isn’t it about time someone wrote it?