Category: People

The man who raised Shasta.

Chlamash, Corradin and Azrooh

Posted by: @fantasia

I only speak for myself, but none of the rest of the books besides LWW, and maybe a tiny bit SC, matters what's going on here on Earth in terms of time period. With LWW the children are sent to stay with a complete stranger due to the war. Something that is a bit harder to reproduce in other ages outside of wars. Did that happen during the Vietnam, Korean, or Gulf war? Not to my knowledge. And England wasn't being bombed at that time. Will they go in a direction like a fostering situation? Or, they may choose the Hollywood direction that drives me crazy, and make Digory a relative to the Pevensies. 

Unlike a plot that's driven by the time period like LWW, in MN the importance of what's going on on Earth is that Digory is living with distant relatives because his mother is extremely ill. Uncle Andrew is attracted to power. Frank is a hard-working but poor laborer. All of these things can happen at nearly any time throughout history. 

I've also responded in the other thread, as has @col-klink, but I just thought of a few more points that would probably be better off in this thread that's more relevant to the subject.

I think it really does come down (as Col Klink also said in the other thread) to plot implications versus iconic imagery. And actually, if we're really going to boil it down to the basics, I would argue that the exact period setting isn't absolutely crucial for any of the books, LWW included.

There's been a lot of discussion, in these threads and in past ones, over whether the WW2 period setting is essential to LWW. Atmospherically, it can be made so, as it is in the 2005 movie and in some stage adaptations, to great effect. But factually — from the standpoint of what C.S. Lewis actually wrote — it isn't.

As I said in the other thread, if you cut out that one reference to "the war" at the very start of the opening chapter, and read the rest of the book with no knowledge of the time setting, there is absolutely nothing in the story that grounds it in a particular period. Especially because all the this-world action takes place in the Professor's old house, which apparently has very little contact with the outside world. It could be taking place in almost any decade of the 20th century.

(And even if it took place in the 1980s or '90s, I can imagine adult Digory, as the slightly eccentric scholarly sort, not having a television — let alone any of those new-fangled computer thingies, which in those days wouldn't even have had the option of an internet connection.)

And the argument that the war is necessary as the premise to get the children out of their home and away from their parents and into this old chap's mysterious house... well, I'm again repeating something I've said before, but there have already been two screen adaptations of LWW that set it in then-modern times (1960s or '70s) and just skimmed over why the children were staying there. I believe the 1967 TV adaptation stated that their parents were away on an archaeological expedition!

The thing is, canonically they're there in the summer holidays (Lucy tells Mr Tumnus that it's summer where she came from, and there doesn't seem to be any fuss about the children having to attend school somewhere, or having lessons from a tutor). I'm sure someone recently mentioned the possibility that Digory / the Professor could actually be some kind of relative of the Pevensies; in fact, going by the earliest fragment of the story that we have — a draft of the opening paragraph (in which the children were originally called Ann, Martin, Rose and Peter!) — Lewis initially DID intend to make the old Professor a relative of the children's mother. So that's not absolutely non-canonical. He could perhaps be a cousin of their grandmother or grandfather, which would put him in the right age bracket and make him distant enough, relation-wise, that it's plausible that they don't know him well and haven't been to his house before.

My point being that there could be various reasons why the children's parents are away, or otherwise unable to have the kids at home the whole time, over the summer holidays — especially if this is set later in the 20th century, when it's much more likely that both parents could have jobs that take them away from home for an extended period. And so arranging for the children to stay for several weeks with an older distant relative, who has a big country house and is willing to take them in, isn't an implausible plot device at all.

Now getting back to MN and the era it's set in... I did also recently write (here) that Lewis invests a LOT more in the period setting of this book than he does in any of the others. He gives us far more details and evocative descriptions of it than he does for the this-world scenes in the rest of the series. I think he did see the period atmosphere of this story as an intrinsic part of it, totally unlike his dismissive treatment of the wartime setting of LWW.

However, I do also agree with @fantasia that the essential elements of the "Earth" section of the plot — "Digory is living with distant relatives because his mother is extremely ill. Uncle Andrew is attracted to power. Frank is a hard-working but poor laborer" — could take place in just about any another era without changing the basic story. The original 1900 setting is very atmospheric, and Lewis makes the most of it, but it's not absolutely crucial to the plot.

And that, of course, is obviously the conclusion Greta Gerwig has come to as well.

So while I'm sorry to be losing the late Victorian setting, which I was really looking forward to seeing on screen, I'm still hopeful that the same basic plot will be played out in the 1950s setting. And that a 1980s or '90s setting is possible for LWW and all the subsequent Chronicles, likewise without any huge changes to the plot. Even if the atmosphere is quite different, the stories themselves could — and I hope will — be essentially the same.

That's why it bugs me that LWW can't really take place during WW2 anymore because that's the entire reason why the Pevensies went to live with the Professor. Pulling that situation out of that context, you have four kids going to live with a stranger, and in this day and age that's downright creepy.

I totally get that.  In 2007, they adapted "Bridge to Terabithia" to the big screen.  The movie was set in then contemporary times (the kids had access to the internet and mobile phones).  But in one of the crucial scenes, Jess still accepts his teacher's invitation to go on an excursion to the Smithsonian Museum.

In 1977 it was rare, but not unheard of, for teachers to take gifted students on excursions to encourage and inspire them.  In 2007, major questions would be raised if a teacher took one of their child students on an excursion on the weekend.  When I see the movie, I find myself thinking "this part of the movie is really taking place in the 1970s" to get around the dissidence and discomfort that I feel.  (And this is a very innocent scene in the movie that should not be invoking this kind of reaction.)

So if MN is going to be set in 1955, it seems that the other ones would be set in the following:

LWW and HHB (HHB takes place during the evens of LWW so I kind of had to put them together)- 1995

PC- 1996

VDT And SC- 1997

LB- 2004

(I'm sure we could have a whole discussion in another thread about updating Narnia to, though). 

So I would have much preferred to see MN set in 1900, I'm just going to wait and see how this 1950's setting turns out. Who knows? It could turn out better than we thought. 

Actually, while of course almost the whole book is told from Digory's perspective (he's not the narrator, but there are only a couple of scenes that he doesn't witness directly), the film doesn't need to follow that exact same format.

Very true.  I would still prefer it if Digory waits at home as per the book.  Cross cutting between the two scenes could be a lot of fun.  Either way, showing the chaos that Jadis causes, rather than merely hearing about it, could be a good change.

Posted by: @courtenay

it's possible that this scene only happens during the last few minutes of her rampage, and Digory hasn't been with her the entire time.

Agreed {ym}:smile: .  I still wonder why Digory can not just put on his ring and transport Strawberry, the Witch and himself back to the Wood Between the Worlds when they are riding along.  If he has the ring in his pocket, he does not even need to hold onto the witch's ankle as they are both touching Strawberry. (I guess, technically it's her boots touching the horse so maybe this would be like wearing gloves.)  I would have thought it would be a lot easier for Digory to get a hold of Jadis and put on his ring in this scene than it was in the book.

Posted by: @courtenay

But one vital element of the scene where Digory strikes the bell is that he doesn't know what will happen if he does. That's exactly what the wording under the bell says:...

I know - I was thinking that the wording could be changed or some premise could be given to indicate that maybe striking the bell could aid Digory in helping his mother.

Posted by: @courtenay

I would actually suggest the scene is more powerful because Digory's motive for striking the bell isn't some burning, overriding desire to do something to save his mother's life. It's quite normal human curiosity and impulse and the temptation to think that we need to do something we've been warned against, just to find out what will happen...

True!  Like Augustine and others, I have done things for not in spite of them being wrong, but especially because they wrong.