PWJ: S3E37 – Narnia – “Voyage of the Dawn Treader” (Part 1)
Now that we’ve finished our main book this season, Matt and I returned to our next book in The Chronicles of Narnia series, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
S3E37: “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader Book, Part 1” (Download)
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Time Stamps
00:00 – Entering “The Eagle & Child”…
00:11 – Welcome
01:12 – Drink-of-the-week
02:18 – Quote-of-the-week
03:51 – Planet Narnia
05:00 – Podcast Crossover!
06:06 – Mo’s Poem
08:35 – Matt’s initial thoughts
10:01 – Chapter 1
15:14 – Chapter 2
22:24 – Chapter 3
27:21 – Chapter 4
31:51 – Chapter 5
33:36 – Chapter 6
45:26 – Chapter 7
56:09 – “Last Call” Bell
57:01 – Closing remarks
YouTube Version
After Show Skype Session
No Skype Session today.
Show Notes
• Today Captain David Bates headed out to sea with my faithful cabin boy, Matt “a scurvy son of a sea dog” Bush…
• For the drink-of-the-week, I was drinking Captain Morgan Rum and Matt was drinking Dewars White Label.
• The quote-of-the-week came from the undragoning of Eustace:
“Sleeping on a dragon’s hoard with greedy, dragonish thoughts in his heart, [Eustace] had become a dragon himself”
C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
• We toasted Patreon supporter, Mo, and since we were reading the Dawn Treader today, it was adventure-themed:
May you go on great journeys in life, you and your wife together.
Toast to Patreon supporter Mo
• I mentioned my solo episode where I outlined Dr. Ward’s hypothesis that each of the books in The Chronicles of Narnia are based on one of the planets of the Medieval cosmos. Dr. Ward believes this book corresponds to the sun.
• We announced that next week we would be having a cross-over episode with Daniel and Phil from The Lamp-Post Listener to talk about the movie adaptation of today’s book.
• I shared a poem from our Patreon supporter, Mo:
look for types and shadows
in the here and there
for the light is not hidden
to those who are aware
if you think I am dreaming
or that eyes can only see
take a trip to Narnia
to see our real reality.
then look for types and shadows
in the Light of our little world
there you will see in wonder
the beauty of His precious pearlFor Joy flows through the understanding
Poem from Mo
that your watch is not the only time
but there is another more valuable
where Your shadows are paradigm.
Matt mentioned Mo’s book, In Mary’s Eyes. We also chatted about the Slack channel which is accessible to Patreon supporters.
• Matt shared his initial thoughts on the book and we then talked through the first seven chapters…
• I. THE PICTURE IN THE BEDROOM
I commented that Eustace’s parents are meant to be members of The Fabian Society.
“There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 1)
Jack gives us some good advice regard what to do if you fall into water:
“[Lucy] kept her head and kicked her shoes off, as everyone ought to do who falls into deep water in their clothes”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 1)
I suggested that Eustace had fallen prey to Screwtape’s “gluttony of delicacy”:
“Plumptree’s Vitaminised Nerve Food and could it be made with distilled water”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 1)
• II. ON BOARD THE “DAWN TREADER”
Not only is the crew looking for the missing Lords, Reepicheep wants to fulfil the prophecy spoken over him years ago:
“Where sky and water meet,
Where the waves grow sweet,
Doubt not, Reepicheep,
To find all you seek,
There is the utter East”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 2)
We read some of Eustace’s diary and I compared it to Orual’s own unreliable narration in Till We Have Faces:
“August 7th. Have now been 24 hours on this ghastly boat if it isn’t a dream. All the time a frightful storm has been raging (it’s a good thing I’m not seasick). Huge waves keep coming in over the front and I have seen the boat nearly go under any number of times. All the others pretend to take no notice of this, either from swank or because Harold says one of the most cowardly things ordinary people do is to shut their eyes to Facts. It’s madness to come out into the sea in a rotten little thing like this. Not much bigger than a lifeboat. And, of course, absolutely primitive indoors. No proper saloon, no radio, no bathrooms, no deck-chairs. I was dragged all over it yesterday evening and it would make anyone sick to hear Caspian showing off his funny little toy boat as if it was the Queen Mary. I tried to tell him what real ships are like, but he’s too dense. E. and L., of course, didn’t back me up. I suppose a kid like L. doesn’t realise the danger and E. is buttering up C. as everyone does here. They call him a King. I said I was a Republican but he had to ask me what that meant! He doesn’t seem to know anything at all. Needless to say I’ve been put in the worst cabin of the boat, a perfect dungeon, and Lucy has been given a whole room on deck to herself, almost a nice room compared with the rest of this place. C. says that’s because she’s a girl. I tried to make him see what Alberta says, that all that sort of thing is really lowering girls but he was too dense. Still, he might see that I shall be ill if I’m kept in that hole any longer. E. says we mustn’t grumble because C. is sharing it with us himself to make room for L. As if that didn’t make it more crowded and far worse. Nearly forgot to say that there is also a kind of Mouse thing that gives everyone the most frightful cheek. The others can put up with it if they like but I shall twist his tail pretty soon if he tries it on me. The food is frightful too.”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 2)
Eustace has an altercation with Reepicheep, in which the mouse calls him a “poltroon” (fantastic word!). Reepicheep uses the flat of his sword to teach him a lesson:
[Eustace] apologised sulkily and went off with Lucy to have his hand bathed and bandaged and then went to his bunk. He was careful to lie on his side.
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 2)
• III. THE LONE ISLANDS
I declared that I still have the sense of humour of a child:
Lucy, who had been talking to Rhince on the poop…
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 3)
I commented that one of my favourite aspects of the Narnia books is where Lewis speaks to us as the narrator:
(By the way, I have never yet heard how these remote islands became attached to the crown of Narnia; if I ever do, and if the story is at all interesting, I may put it in some other book.)
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 3)
They are abducted by slave-traders and the head slave-trader is rather revolting:
“Ah,” said Pug, “I knew your Lordship would pick on the best. No deceiving your Lordship with anything second rate. That boy, now, I’ve taken a fancy to him myself. Got kind of fond of him, I have. I’m that tender-hearted I didn’t ever ought to have taken up this job. Still, to a customer like your Lordship——”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 3)
I noted that on the Island, the Calormen Crescent is the currency used in the slave trade. This will become significant a few books later.
• IV. WHAT CASPIAN DID THERE
Matt pointed out that C.S. Lewis’ stepson, Douglas Gresham, played one of the slave-traders in the market.
Lewis makes it very clear that the Island is run via bureaucracy:
by the time Caspian reached the castle gates, nearly the whole town was shouting; and where Gumpas sat in the castle, muddling and messing about with accounts and forms and rules and regulations, he heard the noise
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 4)
This is the same way he describes Hell in The Screwtape Letters.
When Caspian tells the Governor that he’s banning slavery the Governor protests since he thinks it’s regressive:
“But that would be putting the clock back,” gasped the governor. “Have you no idea of progress, of development?”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 4)
When they come to rescue their friends at the slave market, they discover that the slave-traders couldn’t sell Eustace:
“Oh him?” said Pug. “Oh take him and welcome. Glad to have him off my hands. I never see such a drug in the market in all my born days. Priced him at five crescents in the end and even so nobody’d have him. Threw him in free with other lots and still no one would have him. Wouldn’t touch him. Wouldn’t look at him. Tacks, bring out Sulky.”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 4)
• V. THE STORM AND WHAT CAME OF IT
There is a storm. Eustace is caught stealing water. On September 11th, they arrive on what we will come to know as Dragon Island.
• VI. THE ADVENTURES OF EUSTACE
Eustace discovers that he has transformed into a dragon, which Andrew Lazo said is an inversion of the myth of Narcissus.
He had turned into a dragon while he was asleep. Sleeping on a dragon’s hoard with greedy, dragonish thoughts in his heart, he had become a dragon himself.
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 6)
I compared it to the moment in Till We Have Faces where Orual says “I am Ungit” in front of the mirror.
Eustace begins his metanoia. Matt quoted our favourite phrase, “Incurvatus In Se” which speaks to Eustace’s self-obsessed outlook. I then quoted another Latin phrase “Quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur” which says that anything said in Latin sounds profound!
There was nothing to be afraid of any more. He was a terror himself now 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 realised 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 realised 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.
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 6)
Lucy referenced “Androcles and the lion”, whose story is found in Aesop’s Fable.
“Perhaps it came to us to be cured like in Androcles and the lion.”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 6)
• VII. HOW THE ADVENTURE ENDED
Becoming a Dragon seems to have improved Eustace:
It was, however, clear to everyone that Eustace’s character had been rather improved by becoming a dragon. He was anxious to help…And one day, flying slowly and wearily but in great triumph, he bore back to camp a great tall pine tree which he had torn up by the roots in a distant valley and which could be made into a capital mast. And in the evening if it turned chilly, as it sometimes did after the heavy rains, he was a comfort to everyone, for the whole party would come and sit with their backs against his hot sides and get well warmed and dried; and one puff of his fiery breath would light the most obstinate fire. Sometimes he would take a select party for a fly on his back
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 7)
Eustace tells the story of how he became a boy again, which has echos of Till We Have Faces and The Great Divorce:
I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it. “The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I’ve ever felt…And there was I as smooth and soft … Then he caught hold of me.. .and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I saw why. I’d turned into a boy again
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 7)
The boys talk about Aslan:
“Aslan!” said Eustace. “I’ve heard that name mentioned several times since we joined the Dawn Treader. And I felt—I don’t know what—I hated it. But I was hating everything then. And by the way, I’d like to apologise. I’m afraid I’ve been pretty beastly.”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 7)
Edmund talks about his own dark side:
“That’s all right,” said Edmund. “Between ourselves, you haven’t been as bad as I was on my first trip to Narnia. You were only an ass, but I was a traitor.”
“Well, don’t tell me about it, then,” said Eustace. “But who is Aslan? Do you know him?”
“Well—he knows me,” said Edmund. “He is the great Lion, the son of the Emperor over Sea, who saved me and saved Narnia…”
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 7)
Lewis makes it very clear that, although Eustace has turned over a new leaf, he’s not yet a perfect boy:
It would be nice, and fairly nearly true, to say that “from that time forth Eustace was a different boy”. To be strictly accurate, he began to be a different boy. He had relapses. There were still many days when he could be very tiresome. But most of those I shall not notice. The cure had begun.
C.S. Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chapter 7)