Tirian

you should consider reading it before posting at this forum.
And Tirian, of course, is a descendant of Rilian and Caspian and all the others that came after them.
 
I understand Tirian's reaction to kill Puzzle i dont blame him at all.
After going through everything and seeing his country suffer and seeing the animal that was apart of ruining eveything he had a good reason to almost behead the donkey.
If you were angry puzzle_dear and went through everyuthing that Tirian went thorugh and seeing his land and country he loves suffer, if you were in his shoes and are face to face with the animal who was apart of im sure you'd feel the saem way Tirian did with killing him.
 
she-elfwarrior19 said:
I understand Tirian's reaction to kill Puzzle i dont blame him at all.
After going through everything and seeing his country suffer and seeing the animal that was apart of ruining eveything he had a good reason to almost behead the donkey.
If you were angry puzzle_dear and went through everyuthing that Tirian went thorugh and seeing his land and country he loves suffer, if you were in his shoes and are face to face with the animal who was apart of im sure you'd feel the saem way Tirian did with killing him.
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Absolutely;)
 
Look people, I'm not saying that I hate him, I like him now that I read the book over. All I'm saying is that he shouldn't go around killing people without letting them explain. And don't you try and make Puzzle the bad guy here! He said he was sorry, and besides it was inevitable that Narnia was gonna be destroyed even if he hadn't been forced to wear that skin.
 
We know you arent hating him we are just mentioning that Tirian had his reasons to do what he almost did, but the donkey apologized and Jill practically begged him not to hurt the brute.
 
Okay, okay. I get it! I admit that it was kind of Puzzle's fault that this whole thing happened with Narnia ending, but you shouldn't go about trying to make him look like the bad guy! I'm not overly obsessed with him, just to make it clear. Why don't you look at it from his point of view?
 
B/c i dont enjoy looking through a donkeys point of view:D:D
Just Kidding

I look at shift as the bad guy, not the donkey, but shouldnt he have had some backbone to say NO to the annoiyng brat monkey thing he should have stuck upp for himself but thats how the book is and everythig turned out fine in the end and the annoying monkey got what he deserved.
 
Puzzle did try to say no, but Shift was clever with his words and coerced Puzzle intp dressing up like Aslan. If Shift was clever enough to convince the Calormens to sneak into Narnia, then he was easily clever enough and persuasive enough to trick poor Puzzle.
 
I think that Tirian wasnt "unaware" its just that things happen under our noses...he may have let his gaurd down because of all the peace, however even a king extremely aware of everything can end up in a situation like this. There are always holes in countrys secruitys....and if you have spies you can learn them and then do things to the country without the ruler finding out!!
 
Have you considered, anyone, that in both Caspian and Tirian the same biblical type is embodied? Both of them, in their own way, are the biblical Josiah. As a child, Josiah feared the Lord, and as a young man he restored true worship in Judah--making him a parallel to Caspian. As a mature man, Josiah fought the good fight in the face of an idolatrous population, and died a hero. He was the last good king of Judah--the next good king to reign on David's thone will be the One who sits there forever, the Lord Jesus in His glory. Next to Josiah, no king--not even David--compares in purity of heart toward God. In this way, he is like Tirian (or rather, Tirian is like him).

Have you also considered that beyond the Pevensies, the only kings whose reigns and personalities are really described to us are Caspian and Tirian? We are told of others (i.e., that there were others), but they are "flat" characters, dots on the timeline of Narnia, as it were (Rilian is a bit more developed, but there is never an interactive narative of his reign; we get more action out of Caspian after his death than we get out of Rilian!). Since Caspian and Tirian are the only two kings we really hear about, there is a special connection between the two. These characters do not have a competetive relationship, but a complementary one.
 
I have never thought about that. Do you mean to say that Lewis fashioned Tirian and Caspian after Josiah? I didn't think that he(Lewis) meant to have certain characters in his book like the characters in the Bible.
 
Well, I'm not sure I would buy straight out that he did not mean to fashion his characters after Bible characters. I think to argue that he meant there to be an exact, one to one relationship for every character would certainly be a distortion. But on the other hand, biblical types, or archetypes are clearly in play in his stories. I am not saying it is necessary to see that each Narnian character represents a single biblical one (except for Aslan), but combinations of these archetypes are obviously in the mix.

Josiah himself, though an historical king, is highly archetypal. Anytime you get descriptions like those that describe him (purest, holiest, most sincere, etc.), that's archetype. The same applies to David and Solomon, who become larger than life characters in the Bible. These archetypes are realities that float around and are tapped into by story tellers. If I tell you a story about a young princess, kidnapped and held by a dragon, then rescued by a young knight who kills the dragon then marries her, well, that's me tapping into a bunch of archetypes. I reference things both consciously and unconsciously when I choose to tell such a story.

So, do I think that there is some sort of a "Bible code," that Lewis meant for us to think of Josiah and only Josiah, and we have "missed it" until we do? No, certainly not. But do I think that Josiah as a character, embodying certain archetypes that are bigger than the historical man, was part of Lewis' symbolic vocabulary that he tapped into to create this figure? Yes, absolutely I believe that. Lewis was too literate and too biblically minded for the similarities to be purely coincidence. When writing a story of an ideal land ruled by kings, how could he not think of kings in the Bible, when, after all, the story is mostly about the King of kings from the Bible?
 
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That's a very interesting point, and it's even more interesting when you consider that the ideal behind Josiah's reign was the return to the foundational principles. The scroll of Torah was found during his reign and when read to him, he wept - and then devoted the rest of his life to returning Israel to that principle. This is a recurring theme in the Chronicles. Consider this:

Lion: the White Witch's reign is an interruption of the normal life of Narnia, and the children's arrival returns the land to its prior state.

Caspian: The Telmarine invasion has obliterated Narnia's true identity, and the invaders are transforming the country into their image (notice the vignettes presented during Aslan's Romp: all of children, beasts, and the child-hearted having someone else's will imposed on them). The handful of survivors are referred to as "Old Narnians". Caspian's greatest wish is that the country would return to the way it was before his forefathers invaded, and with the help of Aslan and the Kings and Queens, he succeeds.

Last Battle: Tirian leads what turns out to be a rearguard action to defend and restore the proper Narnian order against the treasonous Narnians and Calormenes.

In a lesser way, but still as a noticeable subtheme, you've got:

Horse: Though he isn't aware, Shasta is returning to his roots, and ultimately the proper order of things is restored when he makes it back to King Lune. His success fends off the imposition of an alien order on Archenland and, ultimately, Narnia.

Chair: Again, the restoration of a lost prince, though under different circumstances. The whole purpose of the mission was to restore the original order of things, which had been interrupted by the Witch's scheming. Again, the success of the venture heads off the imposition of an alien order on Narnia.

These themes aren't as noticeable in Dawn Treader or Nephew, but it's still interesting to see how strongly the idea of the restoration of the earlier, proper order shows up in the stories. Of course, that's only to be expected, since so much of the encouragement in Scripture is for us to cling to what we've been given, preserve it carefully, and pass it along faithfully. Small wonder so many of Narnia's problems are caused by people trying to mess with the way Aslan wanted the land to be!
 
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