This forum was closed on October 1st, 2010. However, the archives are open to the public and filled with vast amounts of good reading and information for you to enjoy. If you wish to meet some Wardrobians, please visit the Into the Wardrobe Facebook group.

Perelandra Reading Group

Open the pod bay doors, Hnau!

Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Stanley Anderson » July 22nd, 2004, 5:45 pm

User avatar
Stanley Anderson
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 3251
Joined: Aug 1996
Location: Southern California

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Guest » July 24th, 2004, 1:25 am

Okay by me.

Elaine
Guest
 

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Guest » July 28th, 2004, 5:35 pm

Guest
 

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby a_hnau » August 3rd, 2004, 7:58 pm

Hi, I'm a newcomer to these forums but a real Lewis-phile. I like the sound of an extended study on Perelandra... Would someone be able to give me an idea of the etiquette of these studies? I wouldn't want just to leap in with comments if there's a way you folks have of doing things...
Urendi Maleldil
User avatar
a_hnau
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 204
Joined: Aug 2004
Location: Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, England

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Sven » August 3rd, 2004, 9:19 pm

Welcome, Tom,
No particular etiquette other than basic good manners :)
Scream and Leap, perhaps not, but Leap and Comment, go for it.

You might look over the OOTSP study that Kanakaberra has been leading, both here in the new fora and the old fora (click on the wardrobe in the upper right of your screen, then on 'message forums', then on the archive for the old fora). That'll give you an idea of how we've done it in the past.

Enjoy!

Selah,
Sven
Rat! he found breath to whisper, shaking. Are you afraid?
Afraid? murmured the Rat, his eyes shining with unutterable love.
Afraid! Of Him? O, never, never! And yet -- and yet -- O, Mole, I am afraid!
Then the two animals, crouching to the earth, bowed their heads and did worship.
User avatar
Sven
 
Posts: 2883
Joined: Aug 1996
Location: Greenbelt, MD, near Washington DC

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby jadis » August 6th, 2004, 1:50 am

i would be up for a book study. can you count me in when you start up? the start up time is not an issue, and it's probably best to give those in the osp study a chance to finish and take a breath before starting a new one. keep me posted though.
jadis
"remember when i lied? just when you needed me. now i sit alone and cry, now i believe in mercy."
-william broad
jadis
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 19
Joined: Jul 2004
Location: NEBRASKA, United States

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby rika » August 10th, 2004, 6:10 pm

I should like to join, and would be a better contributor, like Monica, when school begins again on Aug. 22 . . .
rika
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 4
Joined: Aug 2001
Location: dublin, ireland

re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby TarwathieI » August 8th, 2006, 5:08 pm

I would really love to join this study because I am a HUGE fan of perelandra, it is my favorite book in the series as well as my favorite of all time.
TarwathieI
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 12
Joined: Aug 2006

re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Puddleglee » August 10th, 2006, 11:04 am

'Ridden a wha-ha-ha-hat!' - Bree

Member of the 2456317Club!
Puddleglee
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 79
Joined: Mar 2006
Location: Liverpool, UK

Re: re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Stanley Anderson » August 10th, 2006, 2:24 pm

…on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a fair green country under a swift sunrise.
User avatar
Stanley Anderson
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 3251
Joined: Aug 1996
Location: Southern California

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Jofa » February 24th, 2009, 7:37 pm

Hello, hello, a wardrobian last seen a long time ago emerges from the dark between the fur coats. I almost feel like the Pevensies back in Narnia in Prince Caspian. :)

I figured this will be a good place to post my question. I am currently (still, actually would be a better word to use) working on my MA thesis on Perelandra (A Diagnoses Of Moral Corruption In C. S. Lewis' Perelandra Viewed In Relation to John Milton's Paradise Lost - Milton being a smaller chptr in the beginning as my major is reinessance, but don't really want to have much more to do with it than I have too :wink: ). So, I would like to ask if the participants of the Perelandra book study won't mind if I browse through their deliberations in search of further ideas, and put the forum's address in my bibliography as reference?
"Someday you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again."
User avatar
Jofa
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 57
Joined: Jan 2005
Location: Poland

Perelandra Reading Group - some more?

Postby Jofa » February 27th, 2009, 8:03 pm

Ok, I know it's been a while since the study ended, but I've been reading through it (up to chptr 5.1 so far, plus one of Stanley's posts in chptr 6 - because of the 'opression' topic) and some thoughts caught my eye, I have some comments. I hope the fact I didn't get to the end of the study yet will not make those not valid.

My quotes will be posted in italics as I pasted them in a list into a file and now would be hard to trace them back and actually quote. Comments will be in bold to make this post more readable


I am rather surprised though that after all this philosophy about the spoiling effect of an encore of the bubble trees shower, the next paragraph immediately begins, “He rose and got a second shower from the bubble tree.” I suppose it means that he received it accidentally – ie that he didn’t “try” to get another one, but the mere act of getting up apparently caused one to burst on him (Stanley, I think)

I don't think it needed have been like that at all. I think the significant difference is between repetition out of craving for the experience and repetition out of need. Maybe in this instance Ransom simply somehow felt the need for another bubble-shower. It would soften the "encore=bad thing!" idea making it not a commandment of "Thou shalt not take two bubble-showers one after another" which must be obeyed but sth more subject to "listening" to Maleldil's will.

when Ransom is waiting while the dragon approaches him – ‘ “It’s madness to wait for it”, said the false reason, but Ransom set his teeth and stood.’(...) he is being “prepared” for his encounter with the Green Lady and his role as advocate against the Un-Man’s attacks on her. (probably Stanley again)

Makes me think of faith. The way it is often standing against reason (or false reason). The comment about preparation in this context brings to my mind the place in Ephesians 6 where the Bible speaks of faith as a shield. Ransom must have faith, must be able to fight 'reason' and believe, trust in God/Maleldil and the purpose of all that's going on.

I wonder about the nakedness on Perelandra. Other aspects of the Edenic life have parallels instead of direct similarities (eg fixed land instead of fruit of the tree). This seems to imply that nakedness and covering are somehow fundamental in the representation of innocence and fallen-ness. (I think all of the quotes will be Stanley's)

Definitely. It is going to be a significant part of my thesis. It is the first aspect affected by sin described in Genesis and extremely meaningful. It is a very fruitful topic and branches out into or touches several ideas: separation from God, shame, vanity, desire...the question of the relation nakedness/clothes - vanity is clear in the passage in which Weston makes Lady clothe and look in the mirror. Also I think it would be quite impossible to portray an unfallen world (or it would be extremely abstract) if this topic was somehow replaced and/or omitted.

I am intrigued by the almost surreal quality of Lewis' comment when the Green Lady demonstrates that she is aware of the Incarnation, and Ransom replies with, "You know that ?". Lewis continues, "Those who have had a dream which is very beautiful but from which, nevertheless, they ardently desired to awake, will understand his sensations." I'm not sure I do understand Ransom's sensations as described by Lewis here, but I long to --it is a fascinating mystery that I desire to (and at the same time am sort of afraid of) dive into and explore. Does anyone have any thoughts here?

Stanley, isn't Ransoms experience almost exactly what you described as your experience and attitide towards this whole mystery? That was the first thing that popped into my mind when I read this passage.


I am also absolutely fascinated when Ransom asks how the Green Lady knows the information she is telling him, and she says "Maleldil is telling me". Lewis continues:
"And as she spoke the landscaep had become different, though with a difference none of the senses would identify. The light was dim, the air gentle, and all Ransom's body was bathed in bliss, but the garden world where he stood seemed to be packed quite full, and as if an unendurable pressure had been laid upon his shoulders, his legs failed him and he half sank, half fell, into a sitting position."


(...) But I loved his “resolution” of the confining feeling where, when he “gave in” to it, “it became not a load but a medium, a sort of splenour as of eatable, drinkable, breathable gold, which fed and carried you and not only poured into you but out from you as well. Taken the wrong way, it suffocated; taken the right way, it made terrestrial life seem, by comparison a vacuum.” and the whole topic of feeling "crowded" etc.

The first time this feeling appears is when the Lady mentions she hears/"hears" Maleldil. And for me it is obvious that the change in the landscape, the air, the light is His presence - beautiful, gentle, strong and overwhelming for Ransom, who is absolutely unaccustomed to feeling it so strongly (or at all). It is a presence which requires agreement and humble submission. For one who does that, sort of gives in, it is "breathable gold" and "blliss", for one who stands strong as a separate will it is suffocating.

Maleldil walks with the Tor and Tinidril, like God walked in Eden with Adam and Eve (Gen 3:8). Ransom is fallen, and so he is in a state in which Adam and Eve found themselves after they sinned - when they heard God's footsteps in the Garden they were afraid and hid. And here again we come back to the topic of nakedness/clothing with A&E realising they were naked and dressing in leaves, and with God making clothes for them of animal skins.

It is worth noting that this includes bloodshed - it is the first sacrifice on Earth, for sin.

I often wondered if the first (and last) clothes in Perelandra also meant bloodshed or just that the birds were running around featherless. The text does not say that plainly, does it? Although it does include Ransoms painful thought of knowing exactly which spiecies of birds the feathers came off of. ...this thought is sort of hanging in my mind along with a recently read chapter on Animal Pain from "The Problem of Pain" and some other random connections....no resolution so far.
"Someday you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again."
User avatar
Jofa
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 57
Joined: Jan 2005
Location: Poland

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Stanley Anderson » February 27th, 2009, 10:43 pm

…on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a fair green country under a swift sunrise.
User avatar
Stanley Anderson
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 3251
Joined: Aug 1996
Location: Southern California

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Stanley Anderson » March 1st, 2009, 12:04 am

…on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a fair green country under a swift sunrise.
User avatar
Stanley Anderson
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 3251
Joined: Aug 1996
Location: Southern California

Re: Perelandra Reading Group

Postby Jofa » March 3rd, 2009, 9:33 pm

"Someday you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again."
User avatar
Jofa
Wardrobian
 
Posts: 57
Joined: Jan 2005
Location: Poland

Next

Return to The Space Trilogy

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered members and 11 guests