A medievalist among the pulps: Lewis, Arthur C. Clarke, and the space controversy

On screen ** **Aslan** is the great lion who symbolizes the goodness and justice of Narnia. He is the true king of Narnia and the son of the Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea. He is the only character who appears in all seven books of the Chronicles of Narnia. ** **Reepicheep** is a noble and valiant mouse who serves as a warrior and later a captain in the Narnian navy. He is known for his bravery, his love of adventure, and his loyalty to Aslan. ** **Mr Tumnus** is a faun who befriends Lucy Pevensie in *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardroobe*. He is a kind and gentle creature who helps Lucy escape the White Witch. ** **Cair Paravel** is the royal palace and castle of the Pevensie children, who become the kings and queens of Narnia. It is located at the mouth of the Great River on the coast of the Eastern Ocean. ** **White Witch** is the main antagonist in *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe*. She is the self-proclaimed queen of Narnia and seeks to maintain her power over the land. ** **Turkish Delight** is a magical candy that the White Witch offers Edmund Pevensie in *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe*. It is enchanted to be irresistibly delicious, but it also makes whoever eats it forget their promises and duties. ** **Puddleglum** is a Marsh-wiggle who is a pessimist and tends to be gloomy. He is a key character in *The Silver Chair* and is known for his unwavering loyalty to Prince Rilian despite his doubts. ** **Digory Kirke** is one of the main protagonists in *The Magician's Nephew*. He is a young boy who, along with Polly Plummer, witnesses the creation of Narnia. ** **Polly Plummer** is one of the main protagonists in *The Magician's Nephew*. She is a young girl who befriends Digory Kirke and accompanies him on his adventures in Narnia and other worlds. ** **Peter** is the eldest of the Pevensie children and becomes High King of Narnia in *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe*. He is known for his bravery and leadership. ** **Susan** is the second eldest of the Pevensie children and becomes Queen of Narnia in *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe*. She is known for her kindness, wisdom, and archery skills. ** **Edmund** is one of the Pevensie children who becomes King of Narnia in *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe*. He is known for his bravery, loyalty, and later his role as a leader in the Pevensie family. ** **Lucy** is the youngest of the Pevensie children and becomes Queen of Narnia in *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe*. She is known for her bravery, kindness, and her close relationship with Aslan. ** **Shift** is a cunning and manipulative ape who plays a central role in *The Last Battle*. He orchestrates a plot to deceive the Narnians and bring about the final days of Narnia. ** **Puzzle** is a gentle and innocent donkey who is manipulated by Shift in *The Last Battle*. He is unwittingly used to trick the Narnians into believing that Aslan has returned.

The ship from the 1930s

Un vaisseau spatial sphérique rétro au-dessus d'une campagne anglaise nocturne

Trois hommes discutent autour d'une table de pub, des chopes et un dessin de fusée — A pub in Oxford

In brief: A trilogy written between 1938 and 1945, born from a bet with Tolkien.
Did you know: Influences include H.G. Wells, David Lindsay; a villain, Weston, embodies the dream of space colonization.
On screen: Lewis had a lively and courteous correspondence with Arthur C. Clarke.
Going further: Newly published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.

In brief

As a child, Lewis devoured H.G. Wells' novels, especially The First Men in the Moon, and those by Jules Verne. As an adult, he read American pulp magazines with a mix of enthusiasm and annoyance: he loved the idea of other worlds but hated the vulgarity of many stories. He also discovered A Voyage to Arctopus (1920) by David Lindsay, a strange metaphysical novel that showed him that one could do philosophy with planets.

Did you know

Around 1936, Lewis and Tolkien decided to write the kind of story they would like to read: Lewis chose space, Tolkien chose time. The Silent Planet (1938) was the result. Lewis responded to an ideology he encountered in certain authors and scientists: the dream of humanity colonizing planets at all costs. His villain, Weston, is a physicist who embodies this dream. Before the Oyarsa of Mars, his discourse on the survival of the species rings hollow.

On screen

The three novels featuring Ransom invent a hybrid genre: science fiction for the setting, theological tale for the meaning. Mars (Malacandra) is an ancient and wise world; Venus (Perelandra), a paradise just born; Earth (That Hideous Strength), the fallen and silent planet, where the final battle takes place. Lewis' cosmos is not a cold void but a "sky" full of life and light, as in the medieval cosmology he taught.

Going further

Young Arthur C. Clarke, future author of 2001: A Space Odyssey, member of the British Interplanetary Society, was shocked by the way Lewis portrayed space engineers. He wrote to Lewis in 1943. This led to a lively and courteous correspondence: Clarke defended space conquest as a noble adventure; Lewis feared that man would export his wars and greed into space. They met in an Oxford pub in the early 1950s, with Tolkien, and parted amicably, each holding to their positions. Their letters were published in 2003.

Did you know

In 1955, in Cambridge, Lewis gave a lecture On Science Fiction in which he distinguished several types of stories: engineer narratives interested in machines, those that use another world for satire, and those, which he preferred, that seek the wonderful and the mythical. He defended the genre against the scorn of critics.

In the 1950s, he published two short stories in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, the great American magazine of the genre: The Shoddy Lands (1956) and Ministering Angels (1958), a satire on astronauts. In 1962, he recorded a conversation with the novelists Kingsley Amis and Brian Aldiss, published under the title Unreal Estates.

Did you know

Narnia is not science fiction, but it inherits some of its questions: other worlds, times that flow differently, intelligent non-human peoples. The Magician's Nephew, with Uncle Andrew and his experiments on guinea pigs, is even a small satire of the scientist who thinks he is above the rules, a cousin of Weston.

Going further

Today, the trilogy is considered a classic of religious science fiction, alongside A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller; authors like Madeleine L'Engle or Gene Wolfe have acknowledged their debt to Lewis. In France, The Silent Planet was published in the Folio SF collection.

But it is the dispute with Clarke that seems the most relevant today. At a time when private projects promise to install humanity on Mars, the two positions remain opposed: space as a necessary horizon for the species, or space as a mirror of what we would take with us. Lewis had no technical answer; he posed a moral question, which today's science fiction continues to ask.

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A medievalist among the pulps: Lewis, Arthur C. Clarke, and the space controversy

In brief

Did you know

On screen

Going further

Did you know

Did you know

Going further

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