Sigh..

[textualdeviance]

So, I finished The Silver Chair last night, and I just have one question:

Did Lewis write ANY adult female character who isn't evil or dead?

Wow. No wonder he didn't get married until he was in his 50s. At least Tolkien seemed to admire strong women.

Comments

[mrdorbin.livejournal.com]

One. In the Magician's Nephew. And a kind of personification of Venus-y thing in Perelandra, but I wouldn't really call it positive representation.

Oh, wait, Till We Have Faces has a female protagonist who ends up as an adult, I think. You might like her. Maybe not, though, religious undertones like whoa.

[rebeccama.livejournal.com]

C.S. Lewis was much more sexist than Tolkien although his views on women improved a bit as he got older (which is, I believe, why they got away with the changes to Susan in the film).

While Wikipedia is not always the best source the entry for Lewis does have some interesting discussions and links on the subject.

Also of possible interest: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._E._M._Anscombe#Debate_with_C._S._Lewis

[noipeh.livejournal.com]

Have you read the Horse and His boy yet? There's a female character in that, I think. And Lucy and Susan are grown queens at that point, but marginal in the story. I have a feeling that he had no perspective on females, so he didn't write about them.

Oh, in Voyage of the Dawn Treader there is a strong female character who makes a brief appearance.

And in the last book, the Last Battle, the girl from the Magician's Nephew comes back at the end and it is full grown. She's a bit part though.

Hmmmm, no I guess he really didn't. I didn't notice because I always liked Lucy so much.

[noipeh.livejournal.com]

I forgot to add: The silver chair is my absolute LEAST favorite book of his. Blech. Marshwiggles. Blech.

[textualdeviance.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I remembered the Dawn Treader one. She wasn't around long, though, and I think she was still young, rather than an adult woman, IIRC.

I've just started Horse, and we've met Aravis. Still a younger woman, though, yes?

[textualdeviance.livejournal.com]

Oh, my, yes. What sour, weird froggies.

[textualdeviance.livejournal.com]

I was reading up on him a bit recently, and didn't realize that his initial marriage to Joy was only a green card sort of arrangement. And then she got sick. So I'm not sure he ever really had true, romantic/sexual love with a woman, which may explain a lot.

(My personal theory, of course, is that he had a Big Ol' Crush on Tolkien, which kept him from pursuing relationships with anyone else.)