Meaning of the lamp post?

J

Jolle

New member
I am going to write a big asignment about Narnia, my main book is The lion, the witch and the wardrobe.

I have to write about all the symbols in the story but i cant find any meaning in the lamp post, i talked with my teacher about it and she said that maybe it was supposed to lighten up the fantasy world.
But can any of you say anything about the lamp post that can maybe support my teachers thougts or give me som other things which can lead me to the answer?

Thank you

NB: why is the lamp post missing the thing on the side, i know that the lamp post it comes from misses the thing because the witch brokked it of. But why is it still missing it in narnia? in narnia it is no longer affected by our world it is only a part of the lamp post and when it grows big it misses the part it came from?
 
Hm..that's a good question...personally I think the lamp post symbolises some kind of hope,like a light in a dark,cold world but I'm a little deep,so..:rolleyes: I really dunno.
 
I don't think the lamppost in the Western Waste is missing a crossbar. The text never says that it is, though you may have gotten that impression from the illustrations. (Most lamp-posts would have only one crossbar sticking out to one side, not two.)

If I were you, I wouldn't work too hard to find symbolism in everything about the story, especially considering that it's a Lewis story. There may be some incidental symbolism there (the obvious example would be Aslan Himself), but Lewis stated repeatedly that he never intended to make things in the story symbolic of anything. I realize that trying to interpret the symbolism of tales is a trendy and modern thing to do, and often ends up as an attempt to psychoanalyze the author from a distance, but Lewis was a classicist. He certainly didn't intend any symbolism in the story, and any intent to discern "unintentional symbolism" would be an exercise in absurdity, good for nothing more than a good belly laugh at the Bird 'n' Baby.
 
I think that the lamppost simply "was there" in the first mental image Mr. Lewis had that started it all. If we want a meaning for it, how about this?

Seeing the lamppost standing by itself, in what otherwise looked like an uninhabited wilderness, would give Lucy on her first incursion into Narnia an immediate sign that she had come to a place with different rules than her familiar world. it would be foreshadowing of the greater marvels to come.
 
I agree that it might have been the first thing that was seen. There is symbolism, but it is hard to do that in ALL of the story. I agree it could be light, for a light of hope. Or, to add to the change between the 'real' world and Narnia.
 
I've read some analysis somewhere (I don't remember where) saying that the lamp post symbolizes modernity.

It's brought into Narnia by Jadis in The Magician's Nephew, if I remember correctly, following the mess she did in London.

CS Lewis thought modernity was not necessarily a good thing when it forgets the past. For example, the school (in real world) presented in the Chronicles (I think, in the Dawn, or the Silver Chair) is presented as a modern school, and it brings nothing good in matter of education. CS Lewis was very unconfortable with this kind of modernity.
So the lamp post seems to be here as a remembering of the danger of modernity (since it brought Jadis to Narnia, she who wants to bannish the memories of the past, of Aslan's time). Modernity, progress can bring light, but also evil sometimes...

I can't assure you that it's the correct interpretation. It's just something I remember that was written in some analysis book, explained through my very poor English, sorry. Though I hope it may open some new tracks to you in your research...
 
Philharmagic: Your English is better than that of some forum participants, and your interpretation is a reasonable one.
 
Lamppost

With all the other symbolism present these books (whether C.S. Lewis admits it or not), I figured there might be something in the lamppost. But the more I thought about it, the more it occurred to me there probably isn't any symbolism at all. It is just a lamppost in an odd spot, perhaps to illuminate a certain faun carrying parcels and an umbrella that kind of started the whole Narnia thing. The sory on how the lamppost got there came much later.
 
I looked at the lamppost as a sort of beacon calling to Lucy...you know, it may just be a coincidence, but it was the first thing she pretty much encountered in Narnia other than the snow and Mr Tumnus. I see lampposts and lighthouses like beacons calling out to people...sort of like markers. I can't explain it.

The lamppost was also a reminder to me that evil had been bought into the world by the White Witch and that metal bar thing she threw at Aslan...trying to hurt him in a vain attempt to show her aggressive power. That bar had been bought into the pristine Narnia world by an evil woman who took it from the big city. I sort of saw it too as a bit of corruption of the real world into Narnia's magical pure world. And also, of course, as the place that would be named after it...the Lantern Wastes.

I know CS Lewis in some of the books I have merely put that in there not because of any particular religious symbol but because he was fascinated by them growing up in Northern Ireland where he lived. He would sometimes find a lamppost standing in a wooded area or a field, where an old road had been at one time, and the lamppost a reminder that horses and buggies had crossed there once.

But I'll agree with Philharmagic's post about the lamppost being a symbol of the dangers of modernity.
 
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