The Voyage of the Dawn Treader | Chapter 1: The Picture in the Bedroom

Chapter Summary:

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader begins by introducing Eustace, a cousin of Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy. Eustace is a spoiled child, and a bully. One summer, when their parents and Susan were on a four-week trip, and Peter was staying with Professor Kirke to study for an exam, Edmund and Lucy went to stay with their Aunt and Uncle, Harold and Alberta, and their cousin Eustace. 

One afternoon, Edmund and Lucy are in a bedroom discussing Narnia and admiring a portrait of a ship that they are certain is of Narnian origin. Eustace comes into the room, intent on bullying Edmund and Lucy about their discussion of Narnia--which Eustance believes is an imaginary place. When Eustace asks why Edmund and Lucy like the picture of the ship so much, Lucy says that it's because it looks so real, like it's actually moving.

Then, the three children look at the ship to find that it is actually moving. A wave crashes through the portrait, and the smell of the ocean surrounds them. Terrified, Eustace runs toward the picture to smash it, and Edmund and Lucy follow him. Suddenly, the three children are thrust through the portrait and into the ocean.

People from the ship rescue Edmund, Lucy, and Eustace. When they get on deck, Edmund and Lucy are greeted by King Caspian and Reepicheep (to whom Eustace is extremely rude). Caspian then gives Edmund and Lucy rooms in which to change clothes. Since there are no women's clothes on board, Lucy must wear Caspian's clothes. Lucy is sure that they are about to have a great adventure.

Reflection:

It now seems clear that The Voyage of the Dawn Treader occurs after Aslan tells Peter and Susan that they will not be returning to Narnia. In this story, we will only have Edmund and Lucy to focus on. We also have Eustace, who seems an awful lot like the Edmund that we first met at the beginning of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe--with perhaps a touch more sociopath inserted along the way. 

But with the beginning of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, we discover yet another thing about Narnia that we had not known yet--and it has to do with the nonlinearity of time. Within Prince Caspian, we slowly realize that Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy, despite having been absent from Narnia only a year, return to Narnia several hundred/thousand years later in Narnia time. Thus, we are left to assume that there is a ratio of sorts--somewhere near a 1:1000 ratio, where one second on earth equals a thousand seconds in Narnia--and the same with minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years--etc... 

But interestingly, we learn something wholly different when reading this opening chapter of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader--we learn that our assumption was incorrect:

"Narnian time flows differently from ours. If you spent a hundred year in Narnia, you would still come back to our world at the very same hour of the very same day on which you left. And then, if you went back to Narnia after spending a week here, you might find that a thousand Narnian years had passed, or only a day, or no time at all. You never know till you get there" (p. 296). 

That last part is the kicker. There is not a ratio after all--instead, it is random. From what we can tell about the beginning of this novel, it seems to be taking place at minimum one earth year later than the events of Prince Caspian. We should hypothetically expect, then, that when Edmund, Lucy, and Eustace arrive in Narnia, that they would arrive another thousand years later, but this is not so. Instead, they are greeted by Caspian and Reepicheep--indicating that rather little time has passed at all in Narnia. 

Yet Edmund and Lucy were not surprised to find Caspian and company when they got launched back into Narnia. For some reason, they know to expect the unexpected with Narnia. As human readers, we like to place our expectations into a book--and we do that based on what we already think we know to be true (such as our expectations about time and continuity)--but C.S. Lewis takes us for a spin once again. Narnia does not conform to our expectations.