A Year with Aslan: Daily Reflections from The Chronicles of Narnia

by C. S. Lewis

  MARCH 30

  No Fear

  [H]IS FIRST FEELING was one of relief. There was nothing to be afraid of any more. He was a terror himself and nothing in the world but a knight (and not all of those) would dare to attack him. He could get even with Caspian and Edmund now—

  But the moment he thought this he realized that he didn’t want to. He wanted to be friends. He wanted to get back among humans and talk and laugh and share things. He realized that he was a monster cut off from the whole human race. An appalling loneliness came over him. He began to see that the others had not really been fiends at all. He began to wonder if he himself had been such a nice person as he had always supposed. He longed for their voices. He would have been grateful for a kind word even from Reepicheep.

  When he thought of this the poor dragon that had been Eustace lifted up its voice and wept. A powerful dragon crying its eyes out under the moon in a deserted valley is a sight and a sound hardly to be imagined.

  At last he decided he would try to find his way back to the shore. He realized now that Caspian would never have sailed away and left him. And he felt sure that somehow or other he would be able to make people understand who he was.

  —The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

  Why does Eustace at first feel that there is nothing to be afraid of anymore? What about being a dragon makes Eustace finally appreciate his companions? When in your life has a dramatic change helped you to appreciate those around you?

  MARCH 31

  May You Live Forever

  OH-MY-FATHER- and-oh-the-delight-of-my-eyes,” began the young man, muttering the words very quickly and sulkily and not at all as if the Tisroc were the delight of his eyes. “May you live forever, but you have utterly destroyed me. If you had given me the swiftest of the galleys at sunrise when I first saw that the ship of the accursed barbarians was gone from her place I would perhaps have overtaken them. But you persuaded me to send first and see if they had not merely moved round the point into better anchorage. And now the whole day has been wasted. And they are gone—gone—out of my reach! The false jade, the—” and here he added a great many descriptions of Queen Susan which would not look at all nice in print. For of course this young man was Prince Rabadash and of course the false jade was Susan of Narnia. . . .

  “I desire and propose, O my father,” said Rabadash, “that you immediately call out your invincible armies and invade the thrice-accursed land of Narnia and waste it with fire and sword and add it to your illimitable empire, killing their High King and all of his blood except the queen Susan. For I must have her as my wife, though she shall learn a sharp lesson first.”

  “Understand, O my son,” said the Tisroc, “that no words you can speak will move me to open war against Narnia.”

  “If you were not my father, O ever-living Tisroc,” said the Prince, grinding his teeth, “I should say that was the word of a coward.”

  “And if you were not my son, O most inflammable Rabadash,” replied his father, “your life would be short and your death slow when you had said it.” (The cool, placid voice in which he spoke these words made Aravis’s blood run cold.)

  —The Horse and His Boy

  What is the contrast between the terms the Prince and the Tisroc use to address each other and the actual meaning of their words? Do you think addressing his father with such overblown terms of respect—“Oh the delight of my eyes” and “May you live forever”—has any impact on the way the Prince feels about his father?

  APRIL

  APRIL 1

  Susan’s Bow

  WE MUST TAKE THE GIFTS,” said Peter. For long ago at a Christmas in Narnia he and Susan and Lucy had been given certain presents which they valued more than their whole kingdom. . . .

  They all agreed with Peter and walked up the path to the wall at the far end of the treasure chamber, and there, sure enough, the gifts were still hanging. Lucy’s was the smallest for it was only a little bottle. But the bottle was made of diamond instead of glass, and it was still more than half full of the magical cordial which would heal almost every wound and every illness. Lucy said nothing and looked very solemn as she took her gift down from its place and slung the belt over her shoulder and once more felt the bottle at her side where it used to hang in the old days. Susan’s gift had been a bow and arrows and a horn. The bow was still there, and the ivory quiver, full of well-feathered arrows, but—“Oh, Susan,” said Lucy. “Where’s the horn?”

  “Oh, bother, bother, bother,” said Susan after she had thought for a moment. “I remember now. I took it with me the last day of all, the day we went hunting the White Stag. It must have got lost when we blundered back into that other place—England, I mean. . . .

  “Never mind,” said Susan, “I’ve still got the bow.” And she took it.

  “Won’t the string be perished, Su?” said Peter.

  But whether by some magic in the air of the treasure chamber or not, the bow was still in working order. . . . In a moment she had bent the bow and then she gave one little pluck to the string. It twanged: a chirruping twang that vibrated through the whole room. And that one small noise brought back the old days to the children’s minds more than anything that had happened yet. All the battles and hunts and feasts came rushing into their heads together.

  —Prince Caspian

  Why do you think the sound of Susan’s bow has the power to bring back all those old memories, more so even than walking through their old castle? When has a sound or smell brought back a series of memories for you?

  APRIL 2

  He Has Shown Another Face

  NOW, MADAM,” the King was saying to Queen Susan (the lady who had kissed Shasta). “What think you? We have been in this city fully three weeks. Have you yet settled in your mind whether you will marry this dark-faced lover of yours, this Prince Rabadash, or no?”

  The lady shook her head. “No, brother,” she said, “not for all the jewels in Tashbaan.” (“Hullo!” thought Shasta. “Although they’re king and queen, they’re brother and sister, not married to one another.”)

  “Truly, sister,” said the King, “I should have loved you the less if you had taken him. And I tell you that at the first coming of the Tisroc’s ambassadors into Narnia to treat of this marriage, and later when the Prince was our guest at Cair Paravel, it was a wonder to me that ever you could find it in your heart to show him so much favor.”

  “That was my folly, Edmund,” said Queen Susan, “of which I cry you mercy. Yet when he was with us in Narnia, truly this Prince bore himself in another fashion than he does now in Tashbaan. For I take you all to witness what marvelous feats he did in that great tournament and hastilude which our brother the High King made for him, and how meekly and courteously he consorted with us the space of seven days. But here, in his own city, he has shown another face.”

  “Ah!” croaked the Raven. “It is an old saying: See the bear in his own den before you judge of his conditions.”

  “That’s very true, Sallowpad,” said one of the Dwarfs. “And another is, Come, live with me and you’ll know me.”

  “Yes,” said the King. “We have now seen him for what he is: that is, a most proud, bloody, luxurious, cruel, and self-pleasing tyrant.”

  —The Horse and His Boy

  Do you relate to the Raven’s and the Dwarf’s statements? When have you known someone who acted one way in one place and a different way in another? Are you ever guilty of this?

  APRIL 3

  Royal Responsibilities

  WELL,” SAID ASLAN, “can you use a spade and a plough and raise food out of the earth?”

  “Yes, sir, I could do a bit of that sort of work: being brought up to it, like.”

  “Can you rule these creatures kindly and fairly, remembering that they are not slaves like the dumb beasts of the world you were born in, but Talking Beasts and free subjects?”

  “I see that, sir,” replied the Cabby. “I’d try to do the square thing by them all.”

 
; “And would you bring up your children and grandchildren to do the same?”

  “It’d be up to me to try, sir. I’d do my best: wouldn’t we, Nellie?”

  “And you wouldn’t have favorites either among your own children or among the other creatures, or let any hold another under or use it hardly?”

  “I never could abide such goings on, sir, and that’s the truth. I’d give ’em what for if I caught ’em at it,” said the Cabby. (All through this conversation his voice was growing slower and richer. More like the country voice he must have had as a boy and less like the sharp, quick voice of a cockney.)

  “And if enemies came against the land (for enemies will arise) and there was war, would you be the first in the charge and the last in the retreat?”

  “Well, sir,” said the Cabby very slowly, “a chap don’t exactly know till he’s been tried. I dare say I might turn out ever such a soft ’un. Never did no fighting except with my fists. I’d try—that is, I ’ope I’d try—to do my bit.”

  “Then,” said Aslan, “you will have done all that a King should do.”

  —The Magician’s Nephew

  What are the main tasks that Aslan outlines for the new king and queen? What virtues do these tasks represent? How are these virtues represented in your life?

  APRIL 4

  The Story of Prince Rilian

  THEN IN GOOD TIME on the next day they saddled their horses and rode a great gallop into the northern woods and alighted at the same fountain where the Queen got her death. Drinian thought it strange that the Prince should choose that place of all places, to linger in. And there they rested till it came to high noon: and at noon Drinian looked up and saw the most beautiful lady he had ever seen; and she stood at the north side of the fountain and said no word but beckoned to the Prince with her hand as if she bade him come to her. And she was tall and great, shining, and wrapped in a thin garment as green as poison. And the Prince stared at her like a man out of his wits. But suddenly the lady was gone, Drinian knew not where; and they two returned to Cair Paravel. It stuck in Drinian’s mind that this shining green woman was evil.

  Drinian doubted very much whether he ought not to tell this adventure to the King, but he had little wish to be a blab and a tale-bearer and so he held his tongue. But afterward he wished he had spoken. For next day Prince Rilian rode out alone. That night he came not back, and from that hour no trace of him was ever found in Narnia nor any neighboring land, and neither his horse nor his hat nor his cloak nor anything else was ever found. Then Drinian in the bitterness of his heart went to Caspian and said, “Lord King, slay me speedily as a great traitor: for by my silence I have destroyed your son.” And he told him the story. Then Caspian caught up a battle-axe and rushed upon the Lord Drinian to kill him, and Drinian stood still as a stock for the death blow. But when the axe was raised, Caspian suddenly threw it away and cried out, “I have lost my queen and my son: shall I lose my friend also?” And he fell upon the Lord Drinian’s neck and embraced him and both wept, and their friendship was not broken.

  Such was the story of Rilian.

  —The Silver Chair

  When have you kept something to yourself only to regret it? How do we balance respecting others’ privacy with watching out for them?

  APRIL 5

  Rabadash Made Ridiculous

  LET ME DOWN, EDMUND,” howled Rabadash. “Let me down and fight me like a king and a man; or if you are too great a coward to do that, kill me at once.”

  “Certainly,” began King Edmund, but King Lune interrupted.

  “By your Majesty’s good leave,” said King Lune to Edmund. “Not so.” Then turning to Rabadash he said, “Your royal Highness, if you had given that challenge a week ago, I’ll answer for it there was no one in King Edmund’s dominion, from the High King down to the smallest Talking Mouse, who would have refused it. But by attacking our castle of Anvard in time of peace without defiance sent, you have proved yourself no knight, but a traitor, and one rather to be whipped by the hangman than to be suffered to cross swords with any person of honor. Take him down, bind him, and carry him within till our pleasure is further known.”

  Strong hands wrenched Rabadash’s sword from him and he was carried away into the castle, shouting, threatening, cursing, and even crying. For though he could have faced torture he couldn’t bear being made ridiculous. In Tashbaan everyone had always taken him seriously.

  —The Horse and His Boy

  Why does King Lune no longer consider Rabadash worthy of a duel? How does that wound Rabadash more than a blow?

  APRIL 6

  Excuses

  JUST AS MR. BEAVER had been repeating the rhyme about Adam’s flesh and Adam’s bone Edmund had been very quietly turning the door-handle; and just before Mr. Beaver had begun telling them that the White Witch wasn’t really human at all but half a Jinn and half a giantess, Edmund had got outside into the snow and cautiously closed the door behind him.

  You mustn’t think that even now Edmund was quite so bad that he actually wanted his brother and sisters to be turned into stone. He did want Turkish Delight and to be a Prince (and later a King) and to pay Peter out for calling him a beast. As for what the Witch would do with the others, he didn’t want her to be particularly nice to them—certainly not to put them on the same level as himself; but he managed to believe, or to pretend he believed, that she wouldn’t do anything very bad to them. “Because,” he said to himself, “all these people who say nasty things about her are her enemies and probably half of it isn’t true. She was jolly nice to me, anyway, much nicer than they are. I expect she is the rightful Queen really. Anyway, she’ll be better than that awful Aslan!” At least, that was the excuse he made in his own mind for what he was doing. It wasn’t a very good excuse, however, for deep down inside him he really knew that the White Witch was bad and cruel.

  —The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

  How do you make excuses for yourself? Do you think that deep down you really know the truth?

  APRIL 7

  Reepicheep Joins Caspian

  THE NEXT PLACE they were to visit was quite near at hand, but they had to go a long way round in order to avoid a region in which Men lived. It was well into the afternoon before they found themselves in level fields, warm between hedgerows. There Trufflehunter called at the mouth of a little hole in a green bank and out popped the last thing Caspian expected—a Talking Mouse. He was of course bigger than a common mouse, well over a foot high when he stood on his hind legs, and with ears nearly as long as (though broader than) a rabbit’s. His name was Reepicheep and he was a gay and martial mouse. He wore a tiny little rapier at his side and twirled his long whiskers as if they were a moustache. “There are twelve of us, Sire,” he said with a dashing and graceful bow, “and I place all the resources of my people unreservedly at your Majesty’s disposal.” Caspian tried hard (and successfully) not to laugh, but he couldn’t help thinking that Reepicheep and all his people could very easily be put in a washing basket and carried home on one’s back.

  —Prince Caspian

  Why does Caspian have a hard time seeing the worth Reepicheep and his people can bring to their cause? When have you underestimated someone’s worth?

  APRIL 8

  The Spell

  [LUCY] TURNED ON and found to her surprise a page with no pictures at all; but the first words were A Spell to make hidden things visible. She read it through to make sure of all the hard words and then said it out loud. And she knew at once that it was working because as she spoke the colors came into the capital letters at the top of the page and the pictures began appearing in the margins. It was like when you hold to the fire something written in Invisible Ink and the writing gradually shows up; only instead of the dingy color of lemon juice (which is the easiest Invisible Ink) this was all gold and blue and scarlet. . . . And then she thought, “I suppose I’ve made everything visible, and not only the Thumpers. There might be lots of other invisible things hanging about a p
lace like this. I’m not sure that I want to see them all.”

  At that moment she heard soft, heavy footfalls coming along the corridor behind her; and of course she remembered what she had been told about the Magician walking in his bare feet and making no more noise than a cat. It is always better to turn round than to have anything creeping up behind your back. Lucy did so.

  Then her face lit up till, for a moment (but of course she didn’t know it), she looked almost as beautiful as that other Lucy in the picture, and she ran forward with a little cry of delight and with her arms stretched out. For what stood in the doorway was Aslan himself, the Lion, the highest of all High Kings. And he was solid and real and warm and he let her kiss him and bury herself in his shining mane. And from the low, earthquake-like sound that came from inside him, Lucy even dared to think that he was purring.

  “Oh, Aslan,” said she, “it was kind of you to come.”

  “I have been here all the time,” said he, “but you have just made me visible.”

  “Aslan!” said Lucy almost a little reproachfully. “Don’t make fun of me. As if anything I could do would make you visible!”

  “It did,” said Aslan. “Do you think I wouldn’t obey my own rules?”

  —The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

  What exactly do you think Aslan means by saying he was there all the time?

  APRIL 9

  He Wouldn’t Send Them

  If It Weren’t

  [ASLAN SAID,] “Tell your mistress, Son of Earth, that I grant her safe conduct on condition that she leaves her wand behind her at that great oak.”

  This was agreed to and two leopards went back with the dwarf to see that the conditions were properly carried out. “But supposing she turns the two leopards into stone?” whispered Lucy to Peter. I think the same idea had occurred to the leopards themselves; at any rate, as they walked off their fur was all standing up on their backs and their tails were bristling—like a cat’s when it sees a strange dog.