SEARCHING for NARNIA

The land of Narnia, reached via a magical wardrobe, has many connections to the real world, as the author of a new book on C.S. Lewis’s Oxford explains

SIMON HOROBIN

Stepping off Oxford’s famous High Street into a narrow thoroughfare named St Mary’s Passage brings the unsuspecting tourist face to face with a lion, or rather a lion’s head carved into a wooden doorway. Two golden fauns, clutching pan pipes, peer down from either side of the lintel, while further down the passage stands a Victorian lamppost. The conjunction of lion, faun and lamppost – all covered in a blanket of snow – is often claimed to be the inspiration for the first of the Narnia stories: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. But while it is tempting to imagine that these architectural features are the origin of Aslan the lion, Mr Tumnus the faun and the lamppost that Lucy first encounters when she emerges from the wardrobe into…

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Britain (Digital) - 1 Issue, July/Aug 2024

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