Frank:Be loyal; to your beliefs, to your values, and to your loved ones. Cling to your beliefs in the dark, and never leave behind the ones you love. Helen: Speak for the good of others. Be brave for those who can’t, and be faithful to those who need you. Digory: Logic and reason do not equal cynicism. Be clever, be open, and have faith. Polly: Don’t be afraid of looking like a fool. Say what you’re thinking and ask questions when you need to. Peter: Don’t let your fears hold you back from what you need to do. You don’t need to feel brave to act bravely. Susan: Let yourself be gentle. Be considerate of others; be compassionate. There is strength in gentleness, too, even when others don’t see it. Edmund: Even a traitor may mend: you are not defined by your past mistakes. Forgive yourself, for you have been forgiven. Lucy: Know when to follow, and know when to go on alone. You might not share the world’s values, and it’s important to know when you’re following the wrong thing. Stick to your convictions. Don’t be afraid if you’re the only one. Eustace: Change doesn’t happen all at once. Just because you still fall short doesn’t mean the cure hasn’t begun. Jill: Don’t be afraid to cry. Your feelings are important, and you are allowed to express them. Shasta/Cor: When you are at your highest, stay humble. You are no better at your most fortunate than you were when you felt unfortunate. Aravis: Be true to yourself, and then find the strength to grow. Forget your pride, but never forget you are worthy of love and respect. Corin: Stand up for what matters to you. Stand up for others. Never let your failures stop you from trying again. Bree: Never stop chasing what you want; never stop working to be where you want to be. Keep taking steps towards your goals, and walk with those who share them. Hwin: Give hope to the hopeless. Be there for those who have no one, and stand by them on their journey. Caspian: Don’t give up. Help will come, you’ll make it through, and you will reach your dreams. It’s never too late. Trufflehunter: Know when to hold on. Change is not always progress, and some things are worth staying true to. Sometimes it is good to stay the same. Reepicheep: Be firm in your convictions, and be true to yourself. Go where you are called, even when everyone else turns back. Puddleglum: Believe when it is hardest to. In the dark, still believe in the sun. Some things are more important than your present circumstances, anyways. Rilian: Be devoted; to those you love, and to what you believe in. Tirian: Stand firm, even in the darkest hour, and never stop fighting for a better tomorrow. Give everything for what matters to you. Know that it’s worth the fight.
I love this so, so much.
Aslan: Always remember that someone loves you, no matter who you are or what you’ve done or will do. You always have someone to turn to when you need.
I genuinely think the most of the differences between the Pevensies in the books vs. the movies can be explained by one simple fact: the Movie!Pevensies are fully cognizant of and emotionally attached to their experiences in Narnia after returning to England, while the Book!Pevensies have a notable emotional distance to their memories of Narnia
It’s an explicit plot point in the books that the longer you stay in one world, the easier it becomes to forget about the other one (or think of it as a dream). Additionally, while the Pevensies do remember what happened and are permanently changed by their experiences in Narnia, they seemingly forget a lot of their Narnian-learnt knowledge and skills. This gets briefly mentioned in Prince Caspian, when Lucy talks about swimming:
When they had drunk from the well and splashed their faces, they all went down the stream again to the shore and stared at the channel which divided them from the mainland. “We’ll have to swim,” said Edmund.
“It would be all right for Su,” said Peter (Susan had won prizes for swimming at school). “But I don’t know about the rest of us.” By “the rest of us” he really meant Edmund, who couldn’t yet do two lengths at the school baths, and Lucy, who could hardly swim at all.
“Anyway,” said Susan, “there may be currents. Father says it’s never wise to bathe in a place you don’t know.”
“But, Peter,” said Lucy, “look here. I know I can’t swim for nuts at home—in England, I mean. But couldn’t we all swim long ago—if it was long ago—when we were Kings and Queens in Narnia? We could ride then too, and do all sorts of things. Don’t you think—”
“Ah, but we were sort of grown-up then,” said Peter. “We reigned for years and years and learned to do things. Aren’t we just back at our proper ages again now?” -PC, Chapter 3
So she learned how to swim while growing up in Narnia, but forgot it again when she returned to her own world and was back at her proper age. But the longer the Pevensies stayed in Narnia, the more those previously-learned skills came back to them:
This was real broad-sword fighting. The great thing is to slash at your enemy’s legs and feet because they are the part that have no armor. And when he slashes at yours you jump with both feet off the ground so that his blow goes under them. This gave the Dwarf an advantage because Edmund, being much taller, had to be always stooping.
I don’t think Edmund would have had a chance if he had fought Trumpkin twenty-four hours earlier. But the air of Narnia had been working upon him ever since they arrived on the island, and all his old battles came back to him, and his arms and fingers remembered their old skill. He was King Edmund once more. -PC, Chapter 8
The same general principle appears to apply to their memories and the emotions attached to them (which I think is one of the main reasons why Book!Susan is so easily able to dismiss Narnia as a “silly children’s game” when she gets older). Narnia’s magic protects visitors from feeling the pain and suffering associated with being de-aged/losing their home/etc when they leave Narnia by forcing a mental and emotional distance from their experiences, and they’re only able to re-forge those connections once they return.
By contrast, the Movie!Pevensies are acutely and painfully aware of what they’ve lost by returning to England, and it dramatically alters the equation for everyone involved.
It turns the level-headed, loving, tired Books!Peter into the angst-ridden, hotheaded Movie!Peter who’s constantly trying to prove himself. It turns Susan’s story inside out, because it gives her entirely different reasons and motivations for possibly wanting to forget about Narnia and dismiss it as a “silly game.” It gives Edmund a narrative reason to retain the massive character growth he’d experienced in LWW, act as the steadying rock in the siblings’ lives, and feel like he has something to prove in VDT without Peter around.
And while I think Lucy remains the least changed between the books and movies, there are several added dimensions to her fully remembering her first fifteen years in Narnia that really start to peek their heads out by the time we get to VDT (particularly her desire to feel grown up and desired by the men around her; if she’s truly feeling her age, I think there’s an additional nuance to that plot that goes beyond the vanity and “she wants to be like Susan” dimensions from the book).
Do I think this accounts for all of the characterization differences? No. But I think it’s a massively understated difference that doesn’t get talked about enough as being a major driver of how differently the Pevensies act and react to things in the later books vs. how they act and react in the movies.
in your dreams, your older brother wears a crown of crimson red and speaks of death like a lover, letting it spill past stained teeth and over his tongue with reverence. there is a smile on his face, too wide, too full of glee. your hands are wet and the hem of your dress is soaked and your brother’s hair is turning dark. his sword looks larger than your memory serves, and you never recall the shape his armour ought to be beneath the blood. he holds out a rust-coloured hand and laughs as though the audience he means to present you to is not the dead piled up beneath his feet.
you wake with screams trapped behind cracking lips and silver tears staining your cheeks. you wake early enough to watch the same red you fear spill across his blue skies as you clasp desperate hands until your knuckles turn white and your nails leave marks.
your sister, bright and hopeful, braids your hair with fast fingers. the flowers she pins among your curls won’t wilt until she asks them to and her hands are warm and steady in yours. your younger brother, restless and as pale as you, dips bread into soup like it has offended him but brushes a hand over your tense shoulders with gentleness he always says was taught by you. his voice is calm where his legs are not.
they wait the same as you, with your shoulders straight despite the taste of blood at the back of your throat. the fourth seat remains empty another day, and your voice is called for more often than it ought to if things were right.
you wait for him to come home, victorious, whole, with blood-free teeth and tongue. your siblings wait the same, your sister singing louder and your brother standing taller to fill the empty space.
in your dreams, your older brother wears a crown of crimson red and speaks of death like a lover and of war like home.
(Looking back, there were holes in their beings that they never knew how to understand. Looking forward, it was Narnia. Always Narnia.)
In a wilder Narnia, Peter Pevensie drives his sword through the heart of a grinning witch, before taking off her head too, a growl unfitting for a young boy from England vibrating in his chest and blood dripping from his chin.
In a wilder Narnia, Susan Pevensie still hates the war but masters it in the curve of her smile as she tilts her head to listen to the voices of their land, ready to open her mouth and let her blood-red lips bring down another enemy.
In a wilder Narnia, Edmund Pevensie was enchanted into allowing his siblings to bear wolf-teeth scars on their legs and arms, and this weight transferred into his steps, shaking the ground of the kingdom they inherited.
In a wilder Narnia, Lucy Pevensie grows needle-sharp teeth and claws to fight for the kingdom that would be hers and her family’s home, be it stained with blood or flashed in warning at any that dare step in their way.
In a wilder Narnia, the Pevensie siblings grow in very Narnian ways. They don’t shy away from showing their teeth, from growling at those that refuse to show respect, from reminding everyone that dares to forget that they sat upon their thrones in blood-stained armour and skin. Their eyes shift from blues and browns to amber, their strides carry power and weight, their teeth never hide the possibility of tearing into enemies that find themselves foolish enough to come close.
(In a very grey England, Lucy finds her body soft, fragile, without its claws and screams in anger; Edmund finds his steps too easily overheard and grits his teeth in spite of it; Susan finds her smile seen as shallow and she buys crimson paint for it; Peter finds his chest empty of a growl and throws clenched fists to try and bring it out. In England, they grow in all the wrong ways.)
An interesting theme in these stories is how the concept of “home” changes for the Pevensies. In The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, the siblings are sent away from London, and long to return to what is then their home. In Prince Caspian, they’re back in London, but are unhappy once more, because the city is no longer home to them. They are left in the exact same but opposite situation as before.
love how after the events of lww edmund and lucy are by all accounts nice to each other but peter and susan are still at each other’s throats 15+ years later
Okay, question: Where on earth does this “Edmund is the best swordsman in Narnia” thing come from? I’ve seen in stated as fact rather frequently on this site without any additional context and I don’t remember it being anywhere in the text. As a matter of fact, in Prince Caspian, they decide that Edmund should fight Trumpkin on the implicit assumption that he’s a lesser swordsman than Peter: it’ll prove their point better to Trumpkin if he wins and it will embarrass the Pevensies less if he loses.
Is this somewhere in the text that I’ve just completely forgotten? Does it come from the movies? Or is it just a really bad case of fanon?
This is exactly what I was hoping to hear, and brilliantly articulated. So many good points. It really drives me crazy hearing people’s fanon asserted as though it’s textual, particularly when it makes me go “wait, where are they getting that???” Bad form, imo. Certainly wouldn’t fly in actual lit crit.
I think there’s plenty of evidence in the text that Peter and Edmund were BOTH excellent warriors and excellent diplomats. We don’t get much actual on-page diplomacy in Narnia, so it’s pretty much pointless to argue who’s “better” at it, but what the text gives us on Edmund is that he’s great in judgementwhich =/= diplomacy (and certainly not spy work, my goodness!) He’s good at hearing disputes between people and adjudicating them fairly, a la Solomon and the baby.
But yeah, Peter’s the warrior, as far as my understanding of the text goes. The thing about Edmund fighting Trumpkin demonstrates it pretty well, but then in the same book we get his awesome duel with Miraz! A plan that Peter thinks up and implements pretty much on the spot as soon as he and Edmund arrive at the How, I might add.
Also, the reason why Peter isn’t around to kick Rabadash’s butt in HHB is because he’s off waging an entire war against hostile giants. Like, yeah, we get to see Golden Age Edmund in action as a warrior, but only because Peter is elsewhere already waging an even more impressive war off the page. (Based on the fact that the whole Rabadash imbroglio was decided in one battle while Peter is explicitly fighting a war.)
I think you’re right that fanon tends to view Peter as less interesting and (thus) less capable than Edmund. Maybe because people like a bad boy? Though Edmund ceases to be one two-thirds of the way through LWW, so idk. I’d chalk it a lot of that up to their respective film portrayals, personally. In the Disney movies, Peter is a hothead and not much if a leader. Book Peter on the other hand is hyper-competant and the archetypical Good King. Edmund would be the first person in line to agree with that statement.
This is a recurring issue, I think, in Narnia fandom, at least to some extent because the books aren’t quite what people want them to be. In Narnia, being a Good Guy and a good guy are pretty strongly tied, but in general fandoms love a bad boy and believe that deeply flawed characters are more interesting. That sets up a scenario where people prefer Edmund (and his traitor backstory + general snarkiness - that is canon) and Susan (and the way the narrative leaves her in a tragic lurch) over Peter (and his Arthurian, idealized leadership) and Lucy (and her incredible faith). You even see the movies do this in the way they just persistently assassinate Peter’s character. If you approach the kids in Narnia as existing in a Christian walk (and therefore try to map them more to people in your church than to people in Game of Thrones), I think you get more accurate characterizations.
This isn’t well thought through, but I think there’s something to it.
Oh, I absolutely think you’re right about that! And even with Edmund, people tend to saddle him with loads of extra angst, as though his experience in LWW was some horrific trauma rather than a redemptive story in which he is saved from the clutches of Evil by Aslan’s perfect sacrifice. Every time he refers to his treachery in the text, it’s in the context of how he mended and how Aslan saved him! I just roll my eyes whenever people assume he’d have nightmares the rest of his life or whatever.
And Susan! More unnecessary angst! Yes, she strays from Narnia in the end, but there’s so much more to her story than that! She’s present at the Stone Table! She basically adopted Corin after his mother died! Yes, she spends a lot of PC struggling with grief and doubt, but she gets this utterly redemptive moment at the end when she finally sees Aslan! And then gets to ride on his back again for the romp! I wish, I wishpeople would keep their post-LB angst balanced with everything else that she gets to do and experience and be.
All four Pevensie children (heck, all ten Narnia child protagonists) have stories of grace, faith, courage, and redemption! Not grimdark angstfests. Like Christianity, the Chronicles of Narnia are completely counter-cultural in the messages they send.
@lady-merian I’m exposing your tags too:
You’re totally right that logical, practical, and bookish are far from the same thing. So much nuance!
Peter: logical and decisive; usually practical; scholarly to at least a reasonable degree (studying with Prof Kirke)
Susan: not terribly logical and in fact quite prone to anxiety (although certainly intelligent); very practical, often in a motherly way; not inclined towards bookishness
Edmund: logical and contemplative; doesn’t always prioritize practically, but values smart logistics; very bookish
Lucy: definitely smart, but much more intuitive than logical; not very practical; likes her fairy-tale books
