Document Type

Paper

Publication Date

Spring 2024

Abstract

Magic abounds as the fantastical and ordinary collide in C.S. Lewis’s final work of fiction, Till We Have Faces, and Kenneth Grahame’s children’s classic, The Wind in the Willows. As these authors weave worlds of profound, yet wonderfully simple beauty, they tell stories that point towards the deep intersectionality between seen reality and myth. This paper aims to show the permeability of the veil separating these realms through the concept of sacrament. While sacrament is seen as a kind of gate through which characters may pass to taste and see with new senses, it is contrasted throughout with its opposite, sacrilege, which represents a futile cycle of desperate theft. As characters struggle to manipulate and possess that which is not their own, a redemption of disordered affections is required if they are to be free. In these texts, this redemption can be understood as an “untwisting” of sacrilege into sacrament, or the breaking of a fell enchantment. This paper seeks to analyze this glorious “undoing” through the lives of Till We Have Faces’ Queen Orual and The Wind in the Willows’ notorious misadventurer, Mr. Toad.

Notes

Course: ENG 493, Senior Capstone (Dr. Aaron Housholder)

Faculty Project Advisor: Dr. Aaron Housholder

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