“The scratches on your back, tear for tear, throb for throb, blood for blood, were equal to the stripes laid on the back of your stepmother’s slave because of the drugged sleep you cast upon her. You needed to know what it felt like.” (Aslan to Aravis, in C.S. Lewis's The Horse and His Boy).

All I can say is that this quote is feeling uncomfortably pertinent right now.

There's been a lot of Lewis links and commentary on my f-list lately (including a very nice referral to my own essay on Susan in a recommendation of Andrew Rilstone's recent blog post about the same thing, for which I thank you, kalquessa). Most recently (and thanks to kalquessa yet again) there's this kinda cool article from The Chronicle addressing Pullman's charges against Lewis's Narnia, including sexism, racism, a pernicious belief in heavenly bliss, and lack of love.*

Which reminds me, the other day I found a quite hilarious book-a-minute-style summary of the Dark Materials trilogy by Abigail Nussbaum. Thanks yet again to kalquessa for reminding me where it was.

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* Given the actual content of both series, the only thing I can imagine Pullman means by the latter is that in Lewis's universe twelve-year-olds do not have sex. I am sorry that we are not all as cool and enlightened as you are, Mr. Pullman. Some of us still think this is a little early.

This essay has been brewing in my mind for a couple of years now, and since I was recently reminded of it during a discussion on lizbee's journal, I figured I might as well bite the bullet and put it down on paper. Comments are welcomed, but as I'm due to have my third child on (or before, or around) this coming Saturday, I'm sure you'll appreciate that I can't guarantee a timely response.

Anyway, here it is:

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THE PROBLEM OF SUSAN

Over the last few years I have heard many indignant complaints about the treatment of Susan in the Narnia books, specifically in The Last Battle. Numerous LiveJournal rants have been written on it, Philip Pullman (author of the His Dark Materials trilogy) has deplored it, Neil Gaiman has written a story about it (with the same title as this essay), and most recently it was brought up by J.K. Rowling in an interview with Time Magazine:

"There comes a point where Susan, who was the older girl, is lost to Narnia because she becomes interested in lipstick. She's become irreligious basically because she found sex," Rowling says. "I have a big problem with that."

Do you, Jo? Well, so do I -- albeit for different reasons. ( And here they are, at quite some length )