Yearly Reminder that C.S Lewis encouraged his fans to write fanfiction about Susan Pevensie becoming a friend to Narnia and reuniting with her family once again.
Literally inviting his fans to write Susan’s adult, angsty character development with a happy ending.
Do your duty fans. Write that fanfiction.
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The Pevensie children are too old for their age.
Their mom notices, at the dinner table. She sees no nagging children, no stupid fights. She sees Lucy eating and speaking with perfect manners, Edmund analysing the economy and war with concerning skill, Susan being gracious but poised, like a diplomat.
Their father sees it in Peters eyes the first time they get into a fight. When he moves to punish Edmund for speaking out of turn, Peter calls him out on it. When his gaze meet his eldest son's, he's leveled by the war he sees behind it, the tensed muscle in his arm, the knuckles white around his knife. He's seen that before, in other soldiers. He doesn't know how to react.
Other children notice, too. Talking to all the Pevensie kids at the same time is like being the only one left out of a secret, and the way they touch and tease each other speaks of a history far deeper than their polite demeneor lets on. And when they walk they fall in line, as if there is a natural hierarchy between them.
The first time anyone picks a fight with Edmund, Peter comes home with a three week suspension and blood around his mouth. He looks more alive than you've seen him in weeks.
When Susan gets back in the pool after Narnia, she wins all the contests. Coaches can't explain how to beat her, because they don't understand how she's doing it, either. She seems to almost disappear when underwater.
Lucy, always gay and golden-haired, starts dancing, and never misses a step. She moves with an elegance that no 10 year old should have, and all the girls want to be friends with her
Edmund soon becomes the best student in his faculty. He always seems to know the right thing to say, and teachers laud his ability to think through complex problems. His mouth does get him in trouble sometimes, but the boy seems uncatchable, always talking his way through the cracks. And if not?
No one actively fears Peter, but everyone is a little scared of him sometimes. He's tall for his age, sure, but there is something else, some other air that seems to give him an authority far beyond what's normal for a teenage boy. He's nice enough, but teachers can't stand it, and bullies learn very quickly that pissing him off means missing teeth and black eyes.
The Pevensies are not quite inhuman, but not fully mortal, either
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My favourite thing about The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe is that CS Lewis very obviously knew that kids were going to go hunting in cupboards and wardrobes for Narnia because multiple times he very clearly states that the kids did not close the door behind them when they climbed in the wardrobe because that would be stupid and dangerous. He knew some kid was going to lock themselves in the closet and he obviously didn’t want to be responsible for that.
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So I rewatched The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe today and I gotta say it's weird to me that people misunderstand Edmund and rag on him about getting taken in by the White Witch because it could have happened to any of the siblings.
In fact, Lucy does the exact same thing Edmund does when she first comes to Narnia. She trusts the first person she meets, goes to his house, eats his food and is put under a spell. Literally the only difference is that Tumnus regretted his actions because he wasn't evil. The White Witch had no regrets about how she manipulated Edmund, but the fact remains that she and Tumnus do the same things.
If Lucy had encountered the Witch the first time she was in Narnia, it would have been incredibly easy for the Witch to trick her, probably without even using enchanted food. Lucy was very willing to trust Tumnus until he actually told her he was kidnapping her. If the Witch had been charming with her and asked her to bring her siblings to Narnia Lucy would have tried, just like Edmund.
Susan wouldn't have been much harder, but she would definitely have required some sort of spell since she's so skeptical. But we know that, presented with the actual evidence that Narnia exists, Susan does accept it. From there it'd be fairly easy for the Witch to manipulate her by playing off how Susan's siblings don't like to listen to her logic even when she's right or has better ideas. I think Susan would also like the idea of being a queen and making her siblings listen to her.
Peter is a little harder, just because he's older and more cautious, but I think that it could be done. He has, honestly, the same vice as Edmund at the beginning. He's frustrated at the defiance his little brother is giving him and overwhelmed by the situation he's in. If the Witch could convince him that, when she made him king, his siblings would finally obey him, I think that he, like Edmund, would fall for it (especially if magic was involved in tricking him).
So, yeah, Edmund is just the kid who happens to get taken in by the Witch, but it could have been ANY of the siblings who betrayed the others. And that's the point. Edmund could be any of us- and at the same time, he is all of us. "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." That is the point that Lewis is making with Edmund. It is so easy to let ourselves be deceived when we hear what we want to hear, because that road seems so much easier. But in the end it traps us and enslaves us, like Edmund was to the Witch, and there is only one who can pay the price for our betrayal.
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