(no subject)

[be_themoon]

Apparently, when I have no school to do but yet need something to do - I do sort-of school anyways. In this case, research for a paper that might never get written, about the prevalence of children's stories in which at the end most/all of the protagonists either choose to leave or are forcibly kicked out of the fantasy land they have found. exhibit a, naturally, being Narnia. I even have a timeline now! For series, the date is the year of the first book's publishing.

1865 - Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. English, forcible eviction.
1900 - Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum. American, chooses to return home.
1904 - Peter Pan (the play) by J. M. Barrie. English, chooses to return home. (The book adaptation was published 1911.)
1950 - Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis. English, forcible eviction.
1965 - The Dark Is Rising by Susan Cooper. English, forcible eviction.

Anyone know of other children's literature, at any point in time, in which the children find a different world and have to leave it at the end?

Comments

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

HMM THIS SOUNDS FAMILIAR XD

Do you have access to the Gilead article? Otherwise I can send it to you. Also, not all the endings of the Narnia books are forcible evictions. Are you writing about all seven books?

[sgrio.livejournal.com]

Is that really the only article? I did a very cursory search, but I'm surprised you haven't found more scholarly analysis of Narnia. Hrrrm.

*waits for you to do my work for me*

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

My homework was only thematically applicable to Narnia, but never required me to look for sources specifically about Narnia itself. Most of the Narnia material I've found is mainly editorial.

[be-themoon.livejournal.com]

SUCH THINGS SHOULD BE EVERYWHERE :DDD

I do! through my college's database! FABULOUS. :DDD it is quite an interesting article - I like it!

I do not know what I am writing about, to be honest - I just know that someday I will get a chance to write this essay and it will be fantastic fun. And that is true - I suppose one could make arguments for only LWW being a forcible eviction, but then how much choice are they truly given in the others? it seems like very little to me. (except, of course, The Horse and His Boy and The Last Battle, though I think The Last Battle could count as forcible eviction from life, so.)

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

HAHA. You've been evicted. FROM LIFE. Because that's what happens when you don't pay the life rent on time XD

In the books, is the return at the end of PC voluntary? I only remember the movie, in which... it kind of was. I think LWW and TLB was the most abrupt evictions, but with the others it's kind of like when people give you the courtesy of resigning before they fire you.

[be-themoon.livejournal.com]

... I'm currently reading an article where the author suggests that by simply not writing about sexual desire in Narnia, he leaves the way open for speculation. and then goes on to suggest that since one of his sources was The Snow Queen by Hans Christian Anderson, in which the boy and girl who are like brother and sister at the beginning kiss at the end, incest is a probability. ACADEMIA BACKS US UP, LASS.

I think you would like this entire paragraph:

Certainly there are some differences between the Snow Queen and the White Witch. Most obvious is the fact that the White Witch dies at the end of Lewis's tale, while the Snow Queen does not. Another difference is that the Snow Queen is symbolic of reason and intellect in a way that the White Witch never is. Very noticeable in Andersen's "The Snow Queen" is that when Kai is following the Snow Queen's sleigh on his sled, "all he could remember were his multiplication tables" (Andersen 239) and that while putting together the Snow Queen's mirror, he is playing "the Game of Reason" (259). As Gracia Fay Ellwood notes, "Andersen's icy queen differs from Lewis' in that the former is identified with rationality. [...] She is almost impersonal--she destroys by virtue of what she is, in contrast to Jadis, who is gratuitously cruel and a betrayer. And correspondingly, she is not destroyed at the climax; she is simply absent when Gerda comes for Kay [sic]. Rationality cannot be slain" (23). While the White Witch is cruel for the sake of being cruel, the Snow Queen is simply dispassionate and rational.

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

OMG WHAT ARTICLE IS THIS?? Goddamn, I should've gone into a comp lit program maybe! I hear they're gonna make a 2D animation Snow Queen movie, Betsy, how awesome would that be.

That paragraph is CERTAINLY FOOD FOR THOUGHT. *WILL NOT WRITE SNOW QUEENS CROSSOVER* That is fascinating that it shows Jadis to be the more impulsive, because I have always imagined her to be a vessel for the Deep Magic, as important as any force required in the ~*balance*~ of the world. Almost like she is an anthropomorphized force, almost. But no, here we have the Snow Queen being more like the impartial anthropomorfication. The snow queens persist in different ways. Hmm. It kind of seems like the Snow Queen would totally kick Jadis's ass.

Lewis is not without his "reason is bad if it goes against Jesus!" kind of slant. What is the redemptive force in Snow Queen? Love?

[be-themoon.livejournal.com]

I don't know if the PC return is really voluntary so much as Aslan tells them to and they agree? I do not think they would have really considered leaving otherwise, though perhaps they might have. hmm.

"No sex in Narnia? How Hans Christian Andersen's "Snow Queen" problematizes C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia." I have the PDF if you are unable to find it through your databases. :D I actually just opened one of the databases, searched 'narnia', refined the search results to full text and in academic journals, and then started reading. (62 results! this is going to be FUN.) (holy crap, he just started talking about how if Aslan wasn't always referring to Susan and Lucy as children the romp scenes read almost like sex scenes, and huh, he's absolutely right. O.o)

it does seem like this Snow Queen would kick Jadis' ass! she is all rationality and cold figures, and I think Jadis is much more personally motivated. she has a lot of spite and hatred and anger wrapped up in her coldness - against Edmund, and Aslan, and the Pevensies, and going further back against her sister, and anyone who would deny her what she considers her rightful power.

it is indeed love, from what I gather! Gerda goes after him and kisses him back to his normal self and brings him home, apparently. :)

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's kind of a choice that's not really a choice. OR IS IT? When is it really "time" for them to go? What justifies their departure?

No sex in Narnia?!?! hahaha FANDOM'LL SHOW THEM. What database is this in? JSTOR?

THE ROMP, MAN. Seriously! When I was rereading these books, I was like "wtf wasn't Bacchus like the god of DEBAUCHERY?? he has no place in Christian allegory!!"

Maybe Jadis should go under the Snow Queen's tutelage for a while. The Snow Queen can be like, "Your anger makes you weak." Like jedi training or whatever.

[be-themoon.livejournal.com]

exactly exactly! it reads like a choice, but it totally isn't.

heee! it's actually disproving the idea that there is no sex in Narnia. heee. I do not remember! uh, Gale online? But I have uploaded it for those who want to have a go at it: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=SJKOP8DJ

HAHA! this was about the romp in LWW, but seriously, the one in PC was kind of like a blindside to. (Bacchus? is he... is he talking about the same Bacchus I am? huhhh.)

haha! "You must learn to control yourself. Your emotions will be your undoing." Sometime they'll hook up with Nimueh, who tells Jadis "Things are what they are. You do not choose what the Magic decides."

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

Sweet, I will download that and read it later. I haven't read the LWW book in a while but maybe I will now haha, verify this ~sexuality~. And as for PC, I am not necessarily opposed to it ending in one big drunken orgy.

Sometime they'll hook up with Nimueh, who tells Jadis "Things are what they are. You do not choose what the Magic decides."
AND THEN THEY DUEL WITH LIGHT SABERS. Have you read Z's Narnia fic with the Force stuff in it? 'To the Heart' about Peter?

[be-themoon.livejournal.com]

I think perhaps once I read it? I cannot remember! where is this Force story? :DDDD

NATURALLY they duel with lightsabers. WITCHES TRANSCEND WORLDS. (sometime this needs to be written, all these witches, with their stories about the boys who escaped and sometimes killed them, and their amusement at the futility of such acts. they always return.

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

sometime this needs to be written, all these witches, with their stories about the boys who escaped and sometimes killed them, and their amusement at the futility of such acts. they always return.
THIS TOTALLY NEEDS TO BE WRITTEN.

Back when I was still in the process of falling in love with Z, this was one of the things that sealsed the deal. http://zempasuchil.livejournal.com/79383.html

[be-themoon.livejournal.com]

I knew I loved Z for a reason! (a multitude of reasons, actually.)

I knowww! I would write it but I have apocabigbang and school starting up and.

... BAD LASS.

"Magic certainly loves it's kings," Jadis says, and Nimueh nods.

"They're just figureheads," she says. "They too are used and tossed aside, sacrificed for other ends." The Snow Queen says nothing, adjusting a figure in the equation she is always revising, searching for infinity.

"Still, it is a comfort to know that they didn't last," Jadis says, her lips stained with wine.

"Rex quondam, rexque futurus," Nimueh says. "They will return."

"And so will we." Their lips curve in knowing smiles, and the Snow Queen turns and accepts the glass of wine Nimueh offers her.

"To time," she says, and drains it dry.

[zempasuchil.livejournal.com]

(COMMENTSTALKING YOU GUYS = MY EGO ASPLODE. YOU GUYS YOU MAKE MY DAY OMG <333333)

also I love your cold queens story idea! and their kings are mere boys, too! Nimueh's got a real grown-up king, the others are apparently reckoning with some other force, the hand behind the figurehead, whatever it is.

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

I WANT THESE MAGICAL QUEENS TAKING OVER THE WORLD. Killing lions and shit. Wearing their manes for war trophies! Doesn't Camelot have a lion on its shield? It's perfect.