Comparing The Magician's Nephew By C. S. Lewis

Every good story has some sort of structure, and The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis is no exception. Lewis wrote the story almost exactly parallel to the classic “hero’s journey” plot structure, which despite its common use remains a staple in stories shared and enjoyed people of countless generations. This simple structure begins with the normal world, the calm before the storm. In the case of The Magician’s Nephew, the story starts in London, England, and follows the view of a young girl named Polly. Then, Polly meets the main hero, Digory, who is in London because his mother is deathly ill. Polly and Digory play in Digory’s Uncle’s house, where he is staying. Together, they accidentally stumble upon his Uncle’s magic laboratory, in which

In The Magician’s Nephew, Digory and Polly start out in London, England. Polly finds Digory while playing, and some might argue that meeting one another is their call to action, but neither of them had a moment of refusal at this time, which commonly follows the call in the hero’s journey structure. In fact, Digory invites Polly to play in the walls between their houses, and when he asks if Polly would like to refuse she assures her willingness by declaring “[She is] game if [Digory is],” (Lewis 14). Together, the two explore the walls between their houses and the call to action occurs when they stumble across the laboratory of Digory’s magician Uncle Andrew. Andrew locks the two in the room and tries to get them to follow his bidding, their refusal is clear when Polly tries to back out with the excuse “It’s nearly my dinner time and I got to go home,” (Lewis 16) and Digory chimes in, backing her up with “ it really is dinner time and they’ll be looking for us in a moment, you must let us out,” (Lewis 16). Their requests are in vain, however, and Andrew tricks Polly into taking a ring that causes her to vanish to another world. Hurriedly, Digory follows her with a ring that will return the two of them to where they disappeared from. Thus marks the “crossing” landmark of the hero’s journey,

The cozy atmosphere of the forest entices them to stay and sleep, and they almost forget about one another and succumb to slumber. However, they snap out of it in time to save themselves. This forest represents the first test of their journey. The second becomes clear when the two begin to explore different ponds, and come across a land of desolate ruin, once a place of grandeur and promise. They find a bell that once struck promises to bring the queen of that land back to life, but displays a clear warning as that very queen is the one who destroyed her own palace. Digory rings the bell against Polly’s better judgement, and brings the queen, named Jadis to life. At first, she appears nice enough and expresses her concern for the safety of the three of them, saying “There is great peril here,” then adds “The whole palace is breaking up. If we are not out of it in a few minutes we shall be buried under the ruin,” (Lewis 39). Digory and Polly try to escape from her when she reveals that she killed all of her people, but she latches on to Polly and they end up taking her back to London. Once in London she manages to wreck a street, and in trying to take her back to where she came from Polly and Digory accidentally bring a cabby, Andrew, and a cab horse named Strawberry with them. Again, they try to ditch Jadis in another world, but end up bringing