The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

The faun collects himself but appears awestruck by Lucy, asking if she is “a Daughter of Eve” (17). This question confuses Lucy, but it transpires that the faun, who introduces himself as Tumnus, wants to know if she is a human. Mr. Tumnus is fascinated by where Lucy is from and how she entered Narnia, which is what this strange, wintery land is called.

Mr. Tumnus invites Lucy for tea. Lucy agrees, although she tells him she cannot stay long, and the two set off for Mr. Tumnus’s home. Mr. Tumnus treats Lucy to delicious food and tells her marvelous tales of life in the forest with all its magical inhabitants. Afterward, Mr. Tumnus plays some enchanting music on a miniature flute and lulls Lucy into a dreamlike state. Snapping out of her trance, Lucy says she must return home. Mr. Tumnus begins to cry and tells Lucy that she can’t leave. Lucy becomes frightened, though she tries to comfort the distraught faun. Touched by her kindness, Mr. Tumnus confesses he is crying because he is employed as a spy of the White Witch, an evil queen who has taken control of Narnia. The White Witch’s evil magic causes Narnia to be trapped in a perpetual winter. Mr. Tumnus must capture any humans he encounters and deliver them to the Witch, where they face a bleak but unspecified fate. Lucy urges Mr. Tumnus to let her go and he relents, saying he couldn’t hand her over to the Witch now that he knows her. Mr. Tumnus hurriedly escorts Lucy back to the lamppost, where the two say goodbye and Lucy disappears into the wardrobe, tumbling out into the old Professor’s house.

Lucy rushes to reassure her siblings that she is okay, thinking that she has been missing for hours, but Peter tells her she has only been gone for a few minutes. Lucy tries to take the others back through the wardrobe to see Narnia for themselves. However, when they open the closet, all they see is an ordinary wooden cupboard full of coats. Peter and Susan gently dismiss Lucy’s tale as a childish story, but Edmund cruelly mocks her for living in a fantasy.

When it rains again a few days later, the children play hide and seek. Still curious about the wardrobe, Lucy returns and goes inside. Edmund enters and sees Lucy disappearing into the wardrobe. Intent on continuing to mock Lucy, Edmund follows her, but he soon notices that this is no ordinary wardrobe and that even “his own voice has a curious sound” (35). Emerging into a cold, snowy wood in Narnia, Edmund realizes Lucy was telling the truth all along.

Unable to see Lucy, Edmund is about to go home when a sledge appears bearing a woman dressed all in fur. The woman is very tall and pale and has “a beautiful face in other respects, but proud and cold and stern” (37). The woman calls herself the Queen of Narnia, but it is evident (though not to Edmund) that she is also the White Witch. The Witch demands to know who Edmund is.

The Witch realizes that Edmund is a human boy—a “Son of Adam” (40). On hearing Edmund is human, the Witch drops her frightening demeanor for something seemingly kind and caring. The Witch invites Edmund to sit with her and covers him with her fur mantle to keep him warm. Waving her wand, the Witch conjures up a hot drink and “several pounds of the best Turkish Delight” (43). The Witch carefully interrogates Edmund as he gorges himself on the sweet food. Unbeknownst to Edmund, the sweets are enchanted, and whoever eats them can only think of eating more and more; they would “go on eating it until they killed themselves” (44). Focused only on his desire for more Turkish delight, Edmund absently tells the Witch all about his family. The White Witch is especially interested in the fact that Edmund is one of four siblings. He goes on to reveal that his sister, Lucy, has already visited Narnia and met a faun.

As soon as Edmund finishes the Turkish delight, he desperately wants more, but the Witch doesn’t offer him any. The Witch tells Edmund that she wants to meet his siblings and asks him to bring them to Narnia, promising to make him a king and provide him with unlimited Turkish delight. Edmund accedes, and the Witch lets him go, bidding him to return soon and visit her house, which is visible between the two distant hills.

Lucy appears; she has been having lunch with Mr. Tumnus and is pleased the faun has not been punished by the White Witch for allowing her to escape. Edmund questions Lucy and realizes that the White Witch and the Queen of Narnia are the same person. Still bewitched by the Turkish delight, Edmund convinces himself that the stories of the White Witch that Lucy has told him cannot be true. Lucy and Edmund go back through the wardrobe. Lucy is excited that Edmund can verify Narnia’s existence to Susan and Peter. However, Edmund is reluctant to admit he is wrong.