Things you'd never noticed

MrBob said:
8) Lucy was adamant about going up there and stated that the duffers were not exactly clever or brave so their opinion of this magician couldn't be accepted. It also seemed implicit that she wanted to do it alone and even Reep stated that it was her right to do as they asked if it meant to save them all.
Click to expand...
She was adamant about going up, but it was never suggested that they could all go, just assumed she had to go alone.

Peeps
 
This may or may not be on topic, but I found out through reading one of the books related to Narnia but not part of the series that Coriarkin is actually a star on probation on the island. I thought he was just a magician as the duffers had mentioned.
 
I still want to know what Coriakin did that could cause him to be punished into taking care of the Duffers.

MrBob
 
That's ok - it's a thread for commenting on things you hadn't noticed before, they don't have to be things no-one else has ever noticed! I was just affirming that what you read in another book is indeed mentioned in the Chronicles themselves.

Peeps
 
I've just started re-reading PC (to help with the 'Between LWW and PC' thread), and I noticed these geographical details.

1) I had always imagined the peninsula on which Cair Paravel stood to have been running north-south, across the mouth of the Great River, such that the river turned south before running into the sea; and that the island had been cut off from the mainland by the river eroding through that spur so that it ran straight into the sea rather than turning south.

However, from the description in the text, I now see that the peninsula in fact ran west-east, jutting into the sea, with the River flowing straight into the sea just to the north of the peninsula. Rather than the island being cut off from the mainland by natural erosion, Peter in fact says that some body must have dug a channel to separate the castle from the mainland.

2) I'd also always thought that they had arrived on the south or perhaps south east of the island and moved anti-clockwise. In fact, they seem to have arrived on the east of the island (facing the sea) and definitely moved clockwise. The stream flows into the sea on the north-east side of the island, to the northern side of the channel that cuts the island off from the mainland. They approach Cair Paravel from the north (the orchard was planted outside the north gate of the castle.)

Peeps
 
Last edited:
Just finished TLB, and noticed that as they are running across the Western Wilds, it says that they ran across lakes like speedboats - ie. Jesus-style! Never noticed that before. I must have read these books a dozen times each and yet I still see new things every time.

Peeps
 
Thanks for the observation, Peeps. I love the imagery and description of the true Narnia within Narnia within the Stable and the freedom from the limitations of gravity and physical stamina in the Last Battle.
 
Still new observations coming up!

The Professor is never called Professor Kirke in LWW. The first reference to that name (if reading in publication order) is in VDT.

Also, in PC Reepicheep is described as being "well over a foot high", but in VDT as "about two feet high". Of course, there is no formal contradiction between those two, since both are approximate terms, but the latter definitely sounds taller than the former.

Also, sometime I really want to go through all the geographical details (especially the times taken to get between places) to properly work out the geographical layout of Narnia. For example, this time in LWW I noticed that the Witch's house was only half an hour's walk from the Beavers' house.

And one more thing: in PC it seems as though you must enter Narnia at the same time of day as it is in our world (since they note that the horn was blown at the same time as they were sitting at the railway station). However, on Lucy's first visit to Narnia in LWW, it clearly says that it was night-time when she entered, though it seems to be the middle of the day in England.
 
Last edited:
Oh, and one more (at the risk of turning this into a thread on contradictions and continuity errors), when Lucy first goes through the wardrobe in LWW Ch 1 the lamp-post is ten minutes walk away, but when they return back through the wardrobe as adults in Ch 17 the wardrobe is less than forty paces from the lamp-post.
 
I did notice that the adult Digory Kirke was not NAMED in the first-written book. I believe that this is simply because, at the time he set out, Mister Lewis did not expect to make the Professor any more important in any sequels than he was in Volume One.
 
Copperfox said:
I did notice that the adult Digory Kirke was not NAMED in the first-written book. I believe that this is simply because, at the time he set out, Mister Lewis did not expect to make the Professor any more important in any sequels than he was in Volume One.
Click to expand...
Yes, I figured that too. In fact, he likely didn't have any sequels in mind at all when he wrote the first book. But I have heard that he based the Professor on someone named Mr (or Professor?) Kirkpatrick, who was something of an academic mentor to him in his youth. So I always assumed he was named in LWW, but on this reading I discovered that he wasn't named till later.
 
Yes, there WAS such a real-world professor, who was a paid tutor to young Jack. He is described in "Surprised By Joy." Unlike Digory, this "Kirk" was a fanatical atheist; but in all areas OTHER THAN eternal matters, he was a great benefit to Lewis' intellectual growth.
 
The observation about the Wardrobe and the passage of time/paces to the Lamppost might be explained by the fact that the Wardrobe Door is not always there. I wonder if it didn't always show up in the same exact spot even if it was in the same general area.
 
~Lava~ said:
The observation about the Wardrobe and the passage of time/paces to the Lamppost might be explained by the fact that the Wardrobe Door is not always there. I wonder if it didn't always show up in the same exact spot even if it was in the same general area.
Click to expand...
Interesting hypothesis. I always assumed it was in the location where the Tree of Protection had once stood (though of course the text doesn't say this explicitly).
 
Back
Top