Welcome to Tumnus’s Book Shelf where we review any and all books related to Narnia and CS Lewis! For this weeks review, we will be looking at CS Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian !
Book Title: The Chronicles of Narnia:Prince Caspian.
Author: CS Lewis
Illustrator: Pauline Baynes
Publisher(US): HarperCollins
ISBN-10: 0064471055
ISBN-13:978-0064471053
Summary of the book:
Some Possible Spoilers.( Please Highlight to read)
It has been nearly a year since the Pevensie’s first adventure in the land of Narnia. The four children are waiting at a train station to go back to school when all of a sudden they feel themselves being pulled away. Moments later the children vanish and find themselves on a mysterious island.
While investigating the ruins and other items located on it, they discover that they are back at Cair Paravel in the land of Narnia, and that over 100 years have passed in that world. The children rescue a dwarf named Trumpkin, who serves Prince Caspian.
After proving to Trumpkin that they are the four Pevensies, he tells them what as been going on in Narnia. The land has fallen under control of the Telmarines. The current ruler, King Miraz usurped the throne by murdering his brother and exiling seven lords who would have supported the young Prince Caspian. Miraz pretends to raise the young prince as his own.
Caspian loves the old tales of Narnia that his nurse tells him. One day he tells Miraz these tales. Miraz demands to know who told him such things. Caspian, out of fear of his uncle, says that it was the nurse who is then removed of her duties. Miraz hates any and everything to do with Old Narnia, and has removed any mention of it from their history.
Miraz hires a new tutor for Caspian, one Dr. Cornelius who is half dwarf, half human. In secret Cornelius tells Caspian more about Narnia and about Caspian’s true heritage as the rightful heir to the throne.
Then late one night he helps Caspian escape as Miraz and his wife have had a son of their own. This means they no longer have any need for Caspian as an heir and would kill him.
Cornelius gives him a gift: The horn of Queen Susan, which was given to her by father Christmas in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. The horn can summon help from any where. Caspian escapes by horse into the forest. He falls off and is found by Trumpkin and another dwarf Nikabrik, and Trufflehunter the badger.
After much persuasion they agree to help him. They take him to meet other Old Narnians, which include Reepicheep the mouse, who are fighting for their freedom. After holding a council with them they all agree to head for Aslan’s How, where the remains of the Stone Table on which Aslan was killed still remain.
Once at the How, Caspian decides it is time to sound the horn. Trumpkin goes to Cair Paravel to see if any help has come. This is then the point where the four children enter the story. They leave the island and head for Aslan’s How.
The children get lost as the land has changed in the hundred Narnian years since they were there. Lucy sees Aslan and insists that they should go to where she sees him. No one believes her , except for Edmund, who insists that they listen to her. As everyone else is against her they decide to go the opposite direction.
They discover they are heading in the direction of Miraz’s troops. They double back and Lucy sees Aslan again. This time they agree to listen to her. Slowly the other children begin to see him. Finally the dwarf does too. Aslan sends the boys and the dwarf to Aslan’s How to help Caspian as there is a new threat to him in his own council.
Nikabrik has brought with him some evil companions, a were-wolf, and a Hag, who wish to bring The White Witch Jadis back from the dead. Caspian refuses. Nikabrik, the Hag and the were-wolf attack him. Peter, Edmund and Trumpkin help Caspian defeat the traitors.
After holding council with Caspian, Peter then makes a plan to duel with Miraz. SpoilersTwo scheming lords convince Miraz to agree. After a very long duel, Peter wins. Miraz is killed by the two lords and a battle breaks out.End of Spoilers.
The battle is won by the Old Narnians.Spoilers Aslan reveals that the Telmarinians are in fact from our world. He gives them all the choice to stay or return to Earth. This is important as only a Son of Adam could rule Narnia and as Caspian is Telmarinian, he is a Son of Adam.End of Spoilers
Spoilers Some of the Telmarinians return to our world.End of Spoilers Aslan crowns Caspian the king of Narnia. Caspian then knights Reepicheep, Trufflehunter and Trumpkin. Aslan sends Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy back to our world.
Spoilers However, before he does, he reveals something sad to Peter and Susan. They are too old. They can never return to Narnia.End of Spoilers
The children then find themselves back at the train station, exactly as they left it and head off to school.
Review.
What Lewis did so well with The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, he does even better with Prince Caspian. Though sequels were hardly his intention, the books follow the same path as any sequel: it’s better then the original. It has to be. The first book is just about building your universe and setting up your characters. A sequel, is more freeing as you can explore your characters even more and enrich your world.
One way to explore the characters more is through growth and change. In the case of Prince Caspian that means examining how different Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy are from their first journey to Narnia. It is the fact that these characters actually grow and change that makes the books so unique. How often in a series of children’s books will you find that you have gone through 100 books (with at least five of them being a Christmas/winter story) only to see that the main lead is still 13 years old?
Such things frustrate children as they read such books. Such frustration does not exist in Prince Caspian. The story is set a year later it stands to reason the children would be a year older and they have indeed been changed by going to Narnia the first time. Lucy is now far more stronger and confident. She is willing to actually do things by and for herself. Edmund is no longer a treacherous problem child who harasses Lucy, but rather a kind, gentle and compassionate older brother who is willing to believe her.
Susan and Peter are very much reduced to mere supporting roles next to their siblings. Peter is now a mentor figure, almost like a surrogate Professor Kirke, who examines all things logically. Susan is even more maternal then she was in the first book. This is because the two are getting older and becoming adults, which means in turn that they have to have more adult roles.Spoilers So much so that at the end of the book they are told they can never return to Narnia. This revelation is heart breaking to them and later is one of the many linchpins in Susan’s downfall.End of Spoilers. Lewis is willing in his fantasy series to confront the fact that children grow up.
SpoilersChange is confronted further as the children have to come to grips with Narnia’s different time stream from Earth’s. 100 years have passed since they were there last. Cair Paravel is now in ruins and the peninsula it was on has become an island due to erosion. This also means all of their old friends like Tumnus and Mr. and Mrs. Beaver are all dead. They also have to face that their beloved country has fallen under dark times due to it’s current ruler.End of Spoilers
Because of these dark times they are summoned. Lewis uses his literary history extraordinarily well once again. Lewis makes a comparison in the books to the children from our world returning to Narnia being similar to how many in England believe King Arthur will return to England. A fitting comparison as according to the legends Arthur would return from Avalon in an hour of greatest need, and in deed Narnia is in one of it’s times of greatest need. It is in these dark times that Lewis to an extent explores a nations apostasy or lack of faith. Many in Narnia do not believe or know of Aslan or the four children this leads to Narnia’s downfall. Among the few are Caspian.
Aside from the challenges and changes the children must face there are several new characters the reader encounters in this book. First of all is Caspian. He is very much similar to such Biblical figures as David and King Josiah: a young man with a great destiny who leads his people back to their true faith. He also fits into the literary mode of the young King Arthur in TH White’s The Sword and The Stone, in which the young boy is destined to rule. His heritage and rightful claim to a throne that is filled by a usurper make him a bit like JRR Tolkien’s character of Aragorn in Lord of the Rings.
His uncle Miraz in contrast is like the Biblical kings Saul, and Ahab who lead the nation into apostasy and do not follow the true faith. Miraz is also a figure much like that of Claudius in Shakespeare’s Hamlet as he kills his brother to take the throne.
We also meet Reepicheep the mouse, a character whose bravery is greater then his height. His relationship to Aslan is an indirect reference to Aesop’s fable of the lion and the mouse. However this time it is reversed. After the mice had attempted to free Aslan after his death on the Stone Table they were granted the ability to speak. They are now fiercely loyal to him, Reepicheep most of all. Then in return for their loyalty to Aslan, he restores Reepicheep’s tail when it’s lost in battle. The parallels with the fable lie not just in the lion and mouse helping each other, but also in the message that even those who are very small can help one who is great.
In this book children learn that life is change .We all must grow up. We also must try to hold on to the things we believe in and hold dearly as we grow. They can also learn that even those who are very small can make a big difference.
As always Lewis’s narrations are witty and ironic and always addressing the reader as tough we are on the journey with the children. Admittedly though, most of Caspian’s story is told through a flash back .it shall be interesting to see how that can be pulled off in the film.
Prince Caspian is not only a good sequel , it’s also a good book in it’s own right, chalked full of powerful messages and an even richer literary history. For fans of Narnia, and CS Lewis in reading these books there is only one way to go: “ Further up and further in.”
Five out of Five shields