The Magician’s Nephew: Chapter 7 “What Happened at the Front Door”
C.S. Lewis Read-Along, Vol. 6, Issue 8
Digory and Polly find themselves waiting for much of the chapter. But while Digory waits and worries about Jadis rampaging across London, he overhears something that sparks hope for his mother.
This hope and longing, even in the most difficult circumstances, is something that followed Lewis throughout his life. He saw the longing as pointing beyond itself to a real joy that awaited us.
Chapter 7 “What Happened at the Front Door”
Jadis is undoubtedly an evil character, but, at least in this chapter, she’s also a comical one.1 Aunt Letty sees her unusual height and scandalous bare arms and assumes she must be from the circus. She calls her a “shameless hussy” and a “drunk.”2
Tired of Aunt Letty challenging her, she stands up to her full height and utters the same “horrible-sounding words” that reduced the palace gates in Charn to dust. But nothing happens. She has lost (at least some) of her magical abilities.
Lewis never fully explains why Jadis’ power seems to come and go in different words. We know that she can destroy gates, people, and an entire world with a single word in Charn. In the Wood Between the Worlds, she is seemingly powerless. On Earth, she retains much of her physical strength, but not her magic.
In some sense, it almost seems like the reverse of Superman, who draws superhuman abilities from our sun. It should be no surprise that Jadis, a character who brings death, would have more power in a world with a dying sun. In the Wood Between the Worlds, with its timeless, eternal sun, she loses all her strength. In our world, she only has her physical strength.
But when she realizes her magical powers are gone, “she did not lose her nerve for a second.” She can still use her physical strength, as she picks up Aunt Letty and throws her across the room.
