Perelandra: Chapter 3

Spoiler alert: This post is part of an in-depth discussion of Perelandra by C. S. Lewis, which will inevitably reveal key plot points. Unless you're the sort of person who likes skipping to the last page, go read the book first.

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I'm late! Oh my ears and whiskers.

Narrator-C. S. Lewis was summoned to the country cottage of Elwin Ransom, who informs him he was commissioned by Oyarsa, the spiritual being that rules Malacandra (Mars), to go on a journey to Perelandra (Venus) for reasons as yet unknown. His transportation was a featureless casket, propelled there by Oyarsa himself. Lewis was charged with helping him into the casket, and helping him out again when he returns—if he returns.

Over a year later, Oyarsa summoned Lewis back to the cottage. He and Humphrey, a mutual doctor friend whom Lewis also recruited to help Ransom, witness the return of the casket and help Ransom out again. Ransom began telling the story of his trip to them.

Enclosed in the casket, with only a blindfold to protect him from sunlight in space, Ransom arrives on Venus. The casket dissolves around him, leaving him in open water. The entire surface of Venus is apparently an ocean, and the sky is golden, perpetually overcast. Ransom also discovers that while there is no land, there are a multitude of large floating mats of vegetation He swims for one and climbs on. Exploring, he finds a forest, where he finds some particularly delicious fruit. Then he falls asleep.

Little was known about Venus in 1943. Telescope observations had confirmed a dense cloud cover, but there was no way of knowing what was beneath. It was assumed to be warm, but there was speculation about what lay beneath the clouds: desert, ocean, or vegetation. In the previous chapter, Ransom says:

"Our astronomers don’t know anything about the surface of Perelandra at all. The outer layer of her atmosphere is too thick. The main problem, apparently, is whether she revolves on her own axis or not, and at what speed. There are two schools of thought. There’s a man called Schiaparelli who thinks she revolves once on herself in the same time it takes her to go once round Arbol—I mean, the Sun. The other people think she revolves on her own axis once in every twenty-three hours. That’s one of the things I shall find out."

Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835-1910) was an Italian astronomer best known for his seminal studies of Mars. It was Schiaparelli who first "discovered" the "channels" (translated as "canals" in English) on Mars. He actually made no assumptions about their origin; it was Percival Lowell who ran with the idea of Martian canals being the product of intelligent life. They were later proven to be optical illusions. Schiaparelli also observed Mercury and Venus, and calculated the day of Venus to be 224 Earth days, the same length as its year. He was almost right: Venus's day is actually 243 days long. Venus is also the only planet with a retrograde rotation, that is, clockwise as opposed to its counterclockwise orbit around the sun. Neither this nor Venus's inhospitable climate were known until the 1960s.

Lewis was creating a fictional Venus—one where Ransom could fight a cosmic battle with evil. But it's clear he was well aware of the scientific understanding of Venus of the time, and he blends this with his own imaginative speculation. The same is true of his portrayal of Mars in Out of the Silent Planet.

A significant moment in this chapter is when Ransom discovers yellow fruit in the floating forest. He finds eating the fruit to be indescribably pleasurable. Yet, as he reaches for another one, he realizes, against all reason, that it might be better not to repeat the pleasure. It seems to parallel another discussion—a flashback at the beginning of the chapter, in which narrator-Lewis recounts

a sceptical friend of ours called McPhee was arguing against the Christian doctrine of the resurrection of the human body. I was his victim at the moment and he was pressing on me in his Scots way with such questions as “So you think you’re going to have guts and palate for ever in a world where there’ll be no eating, and genital organs in a world without copulation? Man, ye’ll have a grand time of it!” when Ransom suddenly burst out with great excitement, “Oh, don’t you see, you ass, that there’s a difference between a trans-sensuous life and a non-sensuous life?” That, of course, directed McPhee’s fire to him. What emerged was that in Ransom’s opinion the present functions and appetites of the body would disappear, not because they were atrophied but because they were, as he said “engulfed.” He used the word “trans-sexual” I remember and began to hunt about for some similar words to apply to eating (after rejecting “trans-gastronomic”), and since he was not the only philologist present, that diverted the conversation into different channels. But I am pretty sure he was thinking of something he had experienced on his voyage to Venus.

Of course, "trans-sexual" has a completely different connotation today. But Ransom's retort says that in the resurrection, humans (being both physical and spiritual) will will experience life on a level that transcends mere human appetites (gastronomical or sexual) or sensory experience. It feels to me that Ransom's experience with the fruit is along the same lines. Following one's gastronomic appetite, it would make sense to have another fruit. But the experience itself is a spiritual one, and hence it would be a "vulgarity" to merely repeat it: "like asking to hear the same symphony twice in a day."

That Ransom thinks this way at all suggests that the spiritual environment of Venus is very different from Earth, where such transcendent experiences are nonexistent, and of course we indulge (and overindulge) in sensual experiences all the time.

Not much happens in this chapter; we're still in the introductory section of ''Perelandra''. But it will pick up soon. Stay tuned for chapter 4 on Sunday—hopefully on time this week.

Perelandra: Chapter 2

Spoiler alert: This post is part of an in-depth discussion of Perelandra by C. S. Lewis, which will inevitably reveal key plot points. If you don't want me ruining the experience for you, put this post down and go read Perelandra now. I promise I won't be offended.

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The story so far: The narrator (a fictional version of Lewis himself) was summoned by his friend Professor Ransom on "business," which he understood to mean business having to do with Ransom's trip to Malacandra (Mars), as narrated in the previous novel, Out of the Silent Planet. Walking along the darkened road from the train to Ransom's cottage, he experienced a heavy feeling of oppression. When Lewis arrived at the cottage, he found it deserted, but in Ransom's hallway was a translucent, coffin-like box, and a strange shaft of light he recognized as an eldil, one of the spiritual inhabitants of Malacandra, with whom Ransom still communicated.

At the very end, Ransom finally returns to his cottage. He is relieved to learn that Lewis was not hindered by the "barrage" along the way: the oppressive feelings were real, caused by the dark eldila of Earth. He tells Lewis that they have gotten wind of what he is doing. The Oyarsa of Mars is sending Ransom on a voyage to Perelandra (Venus)—conveying him personally—and the vehicle is the coffin in the cottage.

Ransom does not know how long his trip will last or if he will even return. Lewis is there to pack him into the box. Ransom also charges him with coming back to unpack him, if and when he returns, and with recruiting a trusted successor in case Lewis himself is no longer alive. Lewis also decides to confide in Humphrey, a mutual doctor friend.

Lewis and Ransom carry the box outside and Lewis helps him inside—naked, with nothing but a blindfold to protect his eyes from sunlight. Then Ransom is taken away. Lewis does not see how.

More than a year later, Oyarsa summons Lewis. He and Humphrey return to Ransom's cottage, where they see the coffin descend from the sky. While the two earthbound men are a bit worse for wear, thanks to the ongoing war, Ransom himself looks healthy and even younger. He has a wound on his heel, however, which will not heal. Ransom relates his story over breakfast.

Like Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra involves Ransom being taken on a space voyage, each time by a means unexplained to the reader: to Malacandra in an H. G. Wells-esque sphere designed by the scientist Weston with an unexamined propulsion system, and to Perelandra in a mere box, transported supernaturally, with Oyarsa himself the means of propulsion.

Lewis reminds us that Elwin Ransom is a philologist (established in Out of the Silent Planet). Philology is a branch of linguistics dealing with the historical development of language over time. Ransom's profession helped him learn the Malacandrian language, or Hressa-Hlab. He expresses some disappointment that it is actually the lingua franca of the solar system, Old Solar or Hlab-Eribolef-Cordi, and so he won't get to solve the same problem on Venus. C. S. Lewis was not a philologist, but his friend J. R. R. Tolkien was. As he wrote in his autobiography, "Friendship with [Tolkien] marked the breakdown of two old prejudices. At my first coming into the world I had been (implicitly) warned never to trust a Papist, and at my first coming into the English Faculty (explicitly) never to trust a philologist. Tolkien was both."¹ Lewis's 1960 book Studies in Words is about how a handful of significant English words have changed meaning over the ages, and could be considered a work in philology.²

Ransom jokes, in a self-deprecating manner, about "setting out single-handed to combat powers and principalities." This is an allusion to Ephesians 6:12. This immediately precedes the famous passage about the "whole armour of God," the practice of spiritual warfare, which the Bible describes primarily as practical holiness and effective apologetics (see Eph. 6:13-20 and 2 Corinthians 10:3-6). But here, there's a sense that Ransom expects to do some literal battle; as he interprets that same Ephesians verse, "When the Bible used that very expression about fighting with principalities and powers and depraved hyper-somatic beings at great heights (our translation is very misleading at that point, by the way) it meant that quite ordinary people were to do the fighting." The phrase Ransom renders "depraved hyper-somatic beings" is usually translated "spiritual wickedness" or "wicked spirits," and I'm not sure he's right about it being a bad translation.

Paul does mean there's a spiritual reality behind the "flesh and blood" we strive against, but what Ransom has in mind is clearly going beyond the practice of prayer, faith, and righteousness that Paul says are the weapons of spiritual warfare. The dark eldil of Earth (aka Thulcandra) are in conflict with the eldil of the other planets, and it seems as though Ransom is the proxy for the Malacandrian Oyarsa, doing battle against an enemy on Venus that is yet to be revealed.

The actual voyage to Venus is a story-within-a-story; the first two chapters, at least, are a frame story to set the context. There's no concluding chapter in which narrator-Lewis and Humphrey react to the tale Ransom has told them. With the end of this chapter, Lewis and Humphrey disappear from the narrative. From here on, it's Ransom's own story. See you next Sunday.

Footnotes

¹ Lewis, Surprised by Joy, Fadedpage, updated Sept. 7, 2023, accessed August 9, 2025, https://www.fadedpage.com/books/20150220/html.php.

² Lewis, Studies in Words (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960).

Perelandra: Chapter 1

Today I begin my readthrough of Perelandra by C. S. Lewis, the second book of his Space Trilogy (also known as the "Cosmic Trilogy" or "Ransom Trilogy" in some editions). Sometimes alternatively titled "A Voyage to Venus," this short novel was originally published in 1943.

The story begins with the narrator (a fictionalized version of Lewis himself, presumably) travelling by train, then by foot, to the country cottage of Elwin Ransom, summoned there for "business"—which Lewis understands as something mysterious, and probably having to do with Ransom's previous voyage to Mars, aka Malacandra, as told in Out of the Silent Planet.

The road to Ransom's is dark. Perelandra was published in 1943 and presumably set in about the same time, so blackout regulations were in effect to prevent ground lighting from aiding enemy aircraft. There are darkened cottages and abandoned factories along the road, creating a foreboding atmosphere.

Lewis himself is gripped by unease. He realizes he has left his pack on the train and his first instinct is to return to the station, in spite of the fact that the train is long gone and there's nothing he can accomplish by returning rather than phoning the station in the morning. He is thinking constantly about the eldila, the incorporeal (spiritual?) intelligences Ransom met on Malacandra and apparently still speaks with from time to time. Lewis's fears, it seems, may not be entirely natural: perhaps some supernatural influence is holding him back.

When he arrives at Ransom's cottage, by now in a state of panic, it is empty but unlocked; inside, he discovers a coffin-like box made of something cold and translucent, resembling ice. Then he hears a voice calling for Ransom; the source is apparently a presence in the room that Lewis describes as a shaft of light that does not illuminate its environment. It is an eldil, Lewis realizes; indeed, it is Oyarsa, the ruler of Malacandra himself. Its presence seems to calm his panic. Just then Ransom returns and answers the eldil in its own language, and in spite of the horror he feels, Lewis is relieved to see him.

Lewis (the real one) does a good job of establishing the scene in this chapter. He could have just given a straight recap of Out of the Silent Planet. Instead, he gives a hint of what Ransom had experienced: his captive journey to Malacandra, meeting the inhabitants, and so forth, without giving too much of the story away. If the reader has not read the first novel already, he might be encouraged to do so, although as Lewis himself remarks in the preface, Perelandra can stand alone.

He also does a fine job of describing the eerie atmosphere along the walk and inside Ransom's cottage. In addition to the physical darkness caused by the war, accentuated by empty and ruined buildings, you get the sense that there's another kind of darkness about. The narrator's obsessive ruminations about eldila and alien beings aren't helping his state of mind—but it's almost as though a malevolent, oppressive force is also influencing him on his journey. He has sought excuse after excuse to abandon his visit: the darkness, the loss of his pack, the question of Ransom's sanity or whether his alien friends were good or evil. It is only when he encounters the eldil in the cottage that this oppression is lifted.

Finally, we start to get a sense of how Ransom has changed. In Out of the Silent Planet, he's a fairly straighforward stock character, a kind of reluctant hero or adventurer: someone thrust against his will into unusual circumstances who develops the courage to face his fears and help defeat the plans of Weston and Devine. But narrator-Lewis remarks that since his encounter with the Malacandrians, he's become otherworldly. It's like he's suffered a nervous breakdown, but narrator-Lewis knows that Ransom is as sane as anyone. One does not have a direct encounter with angels and leave unchanged.

I thought this was a great bit of prose, describing how disorienting the eldil was:

It was not at right angles to the floor. But as soon as I have said this, I hasten to add that this way of putting it is a later reconstruction. What one actually felt at the moment was that the column of light was vertical but the floor was not horizontal—the whole room seemed to have heeled over as if it were on board ship. The impression, however produced, was that this creature had reference to some horizontal, to some whole system of directions, based outside the Earth, and that its mere presence imposed that alien system on me and abolished the terrestrial horizontal.

How else can one describe a being that is so…right, it brings its own frame of reference with it and throws yours off-kilter?

Chapter 1 sets up the story, so I have little to say about it now. It does a good job of establishing the scene and setting the atmosphere, but the story will pick up later. We'll continue next Sunday with chapter 2.

Introducing the Space Trilogy readthrough

I suppose I may be one of the relatively few people—Christians, at least—who appreciate C. S. Lewis more as a man of letters than an apologist.

Though I'm sure my route to discovering Lewis is the same as many others': I read the Chronicles of Narnia in about third or fourth grade. (Still have that paperback box set, too.) Then, in university, I found a stash of his nonfiction books in the school library: short books like Broadcast Talks and Beyond Personality, two of the three titles that were edited into Mere Christianity. And, of course, The Screwtape Letters, still probably my favourite piece of satire.

But it was in 1991 that I borrowed Lewis's Space Trilogy for the first time from the public library in Huntsville, where I was living that winter. And as much as I appreciated Narnia, it was through Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength that I came to love Lewis as an author.