Prince Caspian: Ben Barnes & why is he so old?

But in the books, the Telmarines (everybody in fact) speaks a language the kids can understand, which isn't realistic. Since the original king and queen Frank and Helen spoke English, it makes sense that their descendants would speak English -- but if the Telmarines came from España or Italia, it would be odd if they adopted the language of the people they conquered.
 
inkspot said:
But in the books, the Telmarines (everybody in fact) speaks a language the kids can understand, which isn't realistic. Since the original king and queen Frank and Helen spoke English, it makes sense that their descendants would speak English -- but if the Telmarines came from España or Italia, it would be odd if they adopted the language of the people they conquered.
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Yeah, maybe it's just one of those things that C.S. forgot? Or maybe he just didn't think it was relevant to the story. So who knows..... :p
 
It is indisputable that the Telmarines came from "outside" and were NOT descendants of King Frank and Queen Helen. Their ancestors had to have been living on Earth AFTER 1897 or so, since by all evidence access from our universe to the Narnian one does not weave back and forth in time. With the British Empire being at its peak just before World War One, English-speaking seafarers could have turned to piracy in any of a number of parts of the world, finding their way to the island of which Aslan spoke and then entering the Narnian universe.

As for movies like "Gigi": if the story is taking place in France among French characters, you can be sure that within the story-reality they are actually speaking French to each other; our hearing English is like using a Star Trek translation device.
 
This is odd, but I always imagined the Telemarines to be "Mediterranean" if you will. It's like Andrew read my mind or something :confused: When I read PC for the first time, I had this picture in my head of dark-haired, tan-skinned people with heavy accents. So, in a way, the interpretation they're taking in the movie fits perfectly with my interpretation. I still don't know why I imagined them like that, though...heck, I never even imagined Caspian as blonde although Lewis straight-out SAID he was blonde. Very odd indeed :p
 
Going back to MN, we see how Digory and Polly could read the peom on the bell in the Hall of Statues in Charn. At first, they couldn't recognize the writing, but soon they could understand what they read. When Jadis woke up, they could understand her and she could understand them.

A similar concept may be at work in Narnia. Even though two people may speak different languages, they will always be able to udnerstand each other. And since we are on the topic of English, imagine how Narnian English would have changed in the 2,000-2300 years between Frank & Helen and Caspian even with the 30 or so year rule of the Pevensies.

MrBob
 
Chrissi said:
I thought the whole Telmarine Race is supposed to be a bit Spanish/Italien/Whatever?

I think Ben said that in this Factory Magazine Interview a few month ago...
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In the movie, they are.
inkspot said:
They were pirates in our world, and sounds like South Seas pirates based on what Aslan said about them -- their island sounded tropical, but I suppose it could have been a Caribbean island as opposed to an Asian or African one.

So what race were most pirates?
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The South Sea that Lewis spoke of was further clarified at the end of the chapter (when the children go through the door in the sky) as the south Pacific Ocean, but anyone who has read stories like Kidnapped and Swiss Family Robinson would have known that anyways because that what the classic authors when they the South Sea. When I was in highschool I wrote a short story involving pirates and did quite a bit of research on them. The pirates of the South Sea were mainly American, British, some French, some Italians, and practically no Spanish. Depending on the time period or place, they would have been predominantly British and American with a sprinkling of other peoples, or they would have been Malay Pirates like those in Swiss Family Robinson. In the golden age of piracy, pirates were Brits who were promised wealth and fame back home if they were able to take Spanish ships filled with gold from the New World. Queen Elizabeth I knighted at least one of these pirates; his name was Sir Francis Drake.
 
I was thinking of the Malay pirates, when I read the book -- but if they are speaking English -- then I would say they would have been Brits or American, as you and CF have clarified for me. Thank you!

But I like very much the conquistador rigs they've designed for the bad guys in the movie; I love Miraz's armour, and so I guess they have to be Spaniards, and Ben has to have that dumb Spanish accent.
 
No, they don't have to be Spanish, any more than someone who studies Chinese kung-fu is automatically Chinese by physical ancestry. I already gave my reasons for believing that the ancestral Telmarines lived on Earth in comparatively modern times. They would thus have KNOWN ABOUT past ages, including the period of Spanish colonial conquest. Once they were in the Narnian world, growing accustomed to the limited technological possibilities there, they would have been forced to start making weapons and armor for medieval-level warfare; and there would be no reason why they could not imitate the conquistador pattern for armor. As for the accent, there could be many reasons for that.
 
And if, as is more than likely, the original pirates stole their armour from the people they were pirating, why wouldn't a bunch of British Pirates have Conquistador Helmets from the Spanish ships they took? I am fine with the armour but I think that they could have done that without messing with the accent or race of the pirates. We could have the awesome Telmarine from the movie and still have the blonde-haired Caspian and Red-headed Pruniprismia from the book, I think this change is undoubtably the most ridiculous.
 
I agree -- I love the armour but would rather do without the accent, and really, Caspian could have been a blonde Spaniard, I am pretty sure there were such people, if they absolutely wanted him to be hispanic. The accent is annoying.
 
Well, just because there isn't any language barrier, doesn't mean that the pirates were per defination English or American. I mean, the White Witch understood the kids. The poem in Charn was written in English. People from Archenland seemed to speak the same language as people from Narnia. It seems to me that Lewis just didn't really 'create' a language barrier in the story. I mean, the WW isn't English or American, right? Or the people in Charn?

Or am i missing something?
 
If I recall correctly, Jadis in TMN had a magical counterpart of Star Trek language aids. I seem to recall reading that the inscription in the royal hall on Charn was not English at first: it sensed what was the language of the newcomers, and CHANGED INTO their language. Once awakened, Jadis presumably also (by what Dungeons and Dragons would call "a limited form of telepathy") absorbed the ability to speak the language known to Digory and Polly.
 
Just checked my book, and you're right about the Charn poem. Don't see anything about Jadis though... But what about Archenland, or Tashbaan? Or is that because it's in the same world as Narnia automatically English speaking?
 
Archenland's very first human inhabitants were related by blood to Narnia's, so English is obvious there. As for the Calormenes: if Mr. Lewis explicitly intended for them ALSO to be descended from Frank and Helen, English would be logical there, too. Yet even if my imagined scenario happened, with newcomers from pre-Soviet Kazakhstan, those people would have intermarried with whoever it was that became "bandits in Archenland" before the settlement of Calormen, besides the contacts with the English language that my story depicts.
 
As for the Telmarines, statistically speaking, there were far more American and British Pirates in the South Sea than any of the other Western Nationalities. We can assume that since Caspian had Blonde hair he was not oriental which would account for the other major fraction of the Pirates of the South Sea. Whether there by way of Australia (remember, it was a penal colony of Great Britian) or by way of the Americas, it can safely be assumed that Lewis (who knew a lot more about history than AA apparently does) had Brits in mind.
 
"I seem to recall reading that the inscription in the royal hall on Charn was not English at first: it sensed what was the language of the newcomers, and CHANGED INTO their language."

Actually Copper, the inscription never changed. The only thing that changed was Digory's and Polly's ability to read it.

"The South Sea that Lewis spoke of was further clarified at the end of the chapter (when the children go through the door in the sky) as the south Pacific Ocean"

Lava, you are correct, which would mean that the pirates' wives would have been Polynesian. So all of the generations of Telmar residents would have been half-Eurpoean, half-Polynesian. This in itself would have been an interesting way to live in a foreign land--the women speaking one language and the men, their husbands, speaking another. The children would have been exposed to aspects of both cultures.

I wonder if the Narnian Telmarines ever married the other humans who lived in the area such as the Archenlanders, Calormenes, and Islanders?

MrBob
 
Copperfox said:
Archenland's very first human inhabitants were related by blood to Narnia's, so English is obvious there. As for the Calormenes: if Mr. Lewis explicitly intended for them ALSO to be descended from Frank and Helen, English would be logical there, too. Yet even if my imagined scenario happened, with newcomers from pre-Soviet Kazakhstan, those people would have intermarried with whoever it was that became "bandits in Archenland" before the settlement of Calormen, besides the contacts with the English language that my story depicts.
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Copperfox, why do you think that the Calormenes are similar to Kazakhstan people? I find them much more like the Ottoman Empire (that's Turkey before Mr. Ataturk).
 
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