So today, I finally managed to get ahold of our school library's copy of the Space Trilogy. Had to stay after and walk home to do so, but it was worth it. Anyway, I was reading through the part where Augray takes Ransom to Meldilorn, and started thinking.
Weston says, in his chaotic, insane, ramblings, that all men dwell on the 'skin' of things, never in the deeper parts; this is part of his analogy to life and death, and how life is just a thin rind on the top: soon, we sink into death, and the horrible things start. But in both Perelandra, and Malacandra, the hnau dwell not on the surface of their planets, but deeper down: In Malacandra, the hrossa live in the handramits; the pfifltriggi live in caves. In Perelandra, the bug-people live in caves; the mer-people live deep underwater. (I'm assuming both of these races are hnau.) Which got me thinking some more... maybe it's just our bent race, humanity, that believes that the surface is the only good part. After all, Hell is supposed to be down, Heaven high, right? Maybe our desperate fear of sinking below the rind is because that is where the Dark Eldila have taken up residence (at this point, I'd like to point out that Melkor also lived in the deep caverns, as did the Balrogs and Dragons.), deep in the earth. Is this what Weston's ravings reflected? That in our planet, for those who succumb to the dark influence of our own eldila, the rind is the only good part-- when we sink below, into the depths, we suffer a fate more horrible than anything we could've thought possible, at the hands of the dark eldila who inhabit those parts?
Because, as I said, in Malacandra, it seems like the place of living, like so many of our systems, is turned on its head: the surface of the planet is a terrible, inhospitable place-- Ransom describes his journey through it on Augray's shoulders as "... no longer dwelling in a world but crawling the surface of a strange planet." This is also the place in Malacandra where the Bent eldila's influence was most felt: it only had minimal effects among the hrossa and pfifltriggi. So... maybe our fear of the deeper parts, below the rind, is really a bent thing? Or is it irrational, brought on by the fact that Satan awaits us beneath the rind...?
Just wondering if anyone else agreed.
And my apologies if this topic has already been discussed to death...