Susan Pevensie
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Susan Pevensie is one of the major characters from C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia. Susan is the elder sister and the second Pevensie by birth-order. She appears in three of the seven books — as a child in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Prince Caspian, and as an adult in The Horse and His Boy. She is mentioned in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Last Battle. Susan is known for her great beauty and archery skills and is sought after by Prince Rabadash of Calormen. After going to Narnia to help Prince Caspian, she is told that she will not return again. After some years she begins to convince herself that Narnia has just been a game, and she thinks her siblings silly to continue seriously entertaining such childhood fancies.
During her reign at the Narnia capital of Cair Paravel, she was styled Her Majesty Queen Susan the Gentle, Queen of Narnia and also Queen Susan of the Horn.
In the 2005 Disney film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe Susan is portrayed by Anna Popplewell.
Synopsis
In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Susan was given a bow and arrows by Father Christmas, together with a magical horn to blow in difficult times to bring aid. Susan showed her excellence at archery, but was advised to stay out of the battle unless it was absolutely necessary. Together with Lucy, she witnesses Aslan's death and resurrection on the Stone Table. After the battle, she was crowned by Aslan as Queen Susan the Gentle and shared the monarchy with her sister Queen Lucy and her brothers King Edmund and High King Peter. The period of their reign was considered the Golden Age of Narnia. Throughout the book Susan was the voice of caution and common sense. Even at the end after a number of years in Narnia she counseled against pursuing the White Stag, fearing the upset to the established order she and her siblings all sensed the pursuit might bring.
In The Horse and His Boy, Susan played a very minor part. She was described as a gentle lady with black hair falling to her feet. Shasta found her to be the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. As Queen Susan, she was asked to marry the Calormene Prince Rabadash. Her rejection of him provides the Tisroc with an excuse to wage war against Narnia.
In Prince Caspian, Susan's legendary magical horn played an important part. By the time of this sequel her horn was a thousand-year old relic given to the future King Caspian X by his tutor, the half-dwarf magician Doctor Cornelius. When the Prince's life was put in danger by the threat of King Miraz the Usurper, Caspian winded the horn and the Pevensies were magically transferred to Narnia from the railway station. Susan was again shown to be a superb archer. Using the bow and arrows she retrieved from the ruin of Cair Paravel, Susan easily beat the excellent archer Trumpkin the dwarf in a friendly competition. During the course of the story, she pretended to believe Aslan had not come back, even though she later admitted to have known it was true all along. Soon after she also admitted she was grateful for the presence of Aslan during the wild bacchanale in his honor. Aslan discerned that Susan had "listened to fears" but his breath soon restored her faith and she immersed herself in their adventures as deeply as she had in the first book. However, at the conclusion of Prince Caspian, Aslan said she and Peter would never enter Narnia again because they had grown too old.
In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Susan accompanied her parents to America in 1942 while Peter was tutored by Professor Digory Kirke. By that time it was remarked by some adults that Susan was "the pretty one of the family" which caused some insecurity in Lucy. Only the intervention of Aslan allowed Lucy to resist the temptation of invoking a spell of beauty "beyond the lot of mortals" from Coriakin's Magic Book.
In The Last Battle, Susan was conspicuous by her absence. Peter said that she was "no longer a friend of Narnia" because (in Jill's words) "she's interested in nothing now-a-days except nylons and lipstick and invitations". Similarly, Eustace reported that Susan had no memory of Narnia, having told him, "What wonderful memories you have! Fancy you're still thinking about all those funny games we used to play when we were children." Thus, Susan did not enter the real Narnia at the end of the series. There is some controversy, however, as to whether or not Susan's absence is permanent.
Commentary
The Christian significance of Susan's character has been much discussed. Aside from her role together with Lucy paralleling the women in the gospel who first find the risen King, Lewis may have intended her to represent the good seeds which are "choked by thorns" in the parable of the sower from the Gospel of Matthew. Image:Susanpenensie.jpgThis treatment of her has drawn particular criticism from feminist commentators, who draw attention to how she was written out of the end of the story. Critics claim this indicates a fear or hatred of female sexuality on the part of Lewis and even misogyny, claims often linked with other examples of the role of girls and women in the series. Arguing against this view are realistic and positive female characters such as Aravis in The Horse and His Boy and Jill Pole in The Silver Chair.
Nonetheless, this is not the interpretation taken by Lady Polly within the story. She claims that Susan's "whole idea is to race on to the silliest time of one's life as quick as she can and then stop there as long as she can." That is, according to the book, Susan's failure is due to vanity and a false sense of "maturity", not sexuality. Susan provides a striking contrast to her sister Lucy, who is a shining example of the Biblical "faith as a little child." Even her chronologically older brother Peter begins to see Aslan before Susan does in Prince Caspian.
It has been argued that Susan's maternal nature cultivates a sense of self-reliance that prevents her from sufficiently following Aslan (again, going against the sexuality argument). In this interpretation, Lewis intended Susan to represent those who in the confusion of their fallen state find a spiritual call to faith drowned out not by malice on their part but simply by the mundane distractions of everyday life.
Lewis's supporters also point out that the other children enter into the "new" Narnia (representative of the eternal Heaven) because they have died in a train accident, while Susan remains alive on our world, so that there is no proof that she has been permanently "excluded" (i.e., damned). The first footnote under Susan’s entry in Companion of Narnia by Paul F. Ford is very helpful in understanding the meaning behind Susan’s absence at the end of The Last Battle. And perhaps most importantly, Aslan’s last words at the coronation in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe of the four Pevensies to the throne offer the best justification for believing Susan will eventually join the others when the time comes in Aslan’s Country: "Once a King or Queen in Narnia Always a King or Queen in Narnia..."
Fantasy author Neil Gaiman explored this issue in his 2004 short story "The Problem of Susan", in which an elder woman named Susan is depicted dealing with the grief and trauma of her entire family dying at once; the story explicitly refers to Lewis' Susan and presents, in fictional form, a critique of Lewis' portrayal. "The Problem of Susan" is a featured story in the collection Flights: Extreme Visions of Fantasy, edited by Al Sarrantonio. It should be noted that this short story is rather adult in theme.
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