Daniel Williams: Narnia Entry 1, The Shadowlands

In the seventh and final book of Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia, it is revealed that, along with the destruction of Narnia, Lucy, Edmund, Peter, and others have been brought into the "Real Narnia," through the means known in the "shadowlands" (as Aslan refers to our world and the former Narnia) as death. I recall that when I first read this series a couple years ago, I was startled by the ending and even thought it a little macabre. But as I reflected upon it, I began to see an interesting truth in Lewis' perspective (that it, it appears as a truth to those of the Christian faith): all that we know as "reality" now is, in Christian eyes, a shadow of what will be. It is not unreal; I do not mean to suggest (nor, do I think, did Lewis) that the universe as we know it does not exist or is an illusion. But rather, it is more like an imitation of some more fundamental reality, which one might call heaven or eternal life.

But what I find particularly interesting about this idea is that which is discovered when one examines the relevance of myth to this idea of the "more real" reality. Myth, in the sense that it is the retelling in a poetic format of some aspect of reality, enables us to get a glimpse of, or at least arrive at some concept of the "really real." If indeed human origins are mythical, as Lewis believed, then it should be no surprise that myths themselves will tell something about reality that cannot be grasped by other means. In fact, myth should therefore tell us about or demonstrate in some way the "real Narnia" described in this work. That is to say, if reality as we perceive it now is an image (a shadow) of some more fundamental reality, myth then may serve as the means of communicating that more fundamental reality to us who live in these "shadowlands."

If myth does serve this purpose, then the question of whether a myth is true or false is almost irrelevant. I agree with Lewis that some myths are true and some are false, but it is certainly the case that all myths at least attempt to convey some meaning that is relevant to reality, even if the details of the stories are not themselves factual. A reader is not stopped by the fact that a fictional story did not happen, and so therefore it is not historical facticity that the reader is concerned about. Those fictional stories may nevertheless tell something about the real world, even though they were not themselves historical events. Likewise, a myth, whether true or false, may also convey aspects about reality to the reader.

I think, therefore, that the ending to Lewis' Chronicles provides great insight into Lewis' own philosophy regarding reality, and one can easily connect Lewis' views of myth with that philosophy. For Lewis, we are living in the shadow of what is real, and so the value of myth lies in the fact that it enables us to gain understanding of the reality of which our own world is an imitation.