Milton, Spenser and The Chronicles of Narnia: Literary Sources for the C.S. Lewis NovelsIn 1950, Clive Staples Lewis published the first in a series of children's stories that became The Chronicles of Narnia. The now vastly popular Chronicles are a widely known testament to the religious and moral principles that Lewis embraced in his later life. What many readers and viewers do not know about the Chronicles is that a close reading of the seven-book series reveals the strikingly effective influences of literary sources as diverse as George MacDonald's fantastic fiction and the courtly love poetry of the High Middle Ages. Arguably the two most influential sources for the series are Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queen and John Milton's Paradise Lost. Lewis was so personally intrigued by these two particular pieces of literature that he became renowned for his scholarly studies of both Milton and Spenser. This book examines the important ways in which Lewis so clearly echoes The Faerie Queen and Paradise Lost, and how the elements of each work together to convey similar meanings. Most specifically, the chapters focus on the telling interweavings that can be seen in the depiction of evil, female characters, fantastic and symbolic landscapes and settings, and the spiritual concepts so personally important to C.S. Lewis. |
From inside the book
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... stories I had loved since childhood. I began to suspect that my interest in the works of Spenser and Milton might have been partially fueled by meeting some of their characters, settings, and themes before: in Narnia. Perhaps I admired ...
... stories, continue to find new readers with each generation. A good deal of the scholarly interest in the books, though, comes from the fact that they are wonderful stories, stories that enchant, delight, and enthrall children and adults ...
... . . . . HHB The Magician's Nephew . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MN The Last Battle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . LB Introduction “Any children's story,” wrote C.S. Lewis, “that can be 5 A Note on Citations.
... story.” “Jack” Lewis, known in a variety of contexts as Oxford don, Christian apologist, literary critic, and novelist, was well aware that didactic or heavy-handed children's stories, laden with things children “should” like, insulted ...
... stories are just as likely to receive a nod as are the plays of Shakespeare. Works with which he was both personally and professionally involved were even more likely to be powerful influences: “When Lewis began to write fiction, much ...
Contents
17 | |
The Depiction of Evil Men Mortals Monsters and Misled Protagonists | 51 |
Girls Whose Heads Have Something Inside Them The Characterization of Women | 77 |
An Inside Bigger Than Its Outside Setting and Geography | 107 |
Knowing Him Better There Spirituality and Belief | 135 |
Conclusion | 159 |
Chapter Notes | 163 |
Bibliography | 177 |
Index | 183 |