Lewis and the World Wars
Posted: Jun 10, 2014 3:04 pm
As most of us know, Lewis set LWW in World War II and wrote for the children of that time. A friend of mine posted this link to a series of pictures of an apartment that was abandoned during that time period, and it struck me as a strange reminder of what those children were going through. Like the woman with this apartment, most of the children probably left most of their things at home, taking only what they could carry to go to strange places far away. This is, of course, the premise of LWW, but at the same time, it is also what his audience was familiar with. I suppose the war affected the series in more ways than one, and I think it would be interesting to discuss the historical context of the series, as well as how it might have affected Lewis and his intended audience.
Another thing is, in one of these pictures, you can see a Mickey Mouse doll. Mickey Mouse was 11 years old when World War II started. So, when Disney worked with the CoN Franchise, they were actually working with a series that is only slightly younger than their iconic figure--Lucy and the other children might have known about Disney's character. It would also make Lewis and Disney contemporaries, which seems a bit surprising to me. Lewis seems so much older.
Another thing is, in one of these pictures, you can see a Mickey Mouse doll. Mickey Mouse was 11 years old when World War II started. So, when Disney worked with the CoN Franchise, they were actually working with a series that is only slightly younger than their iconic figure--Lucy and the other children might have known about Disney's character. It would also make Lewis and Disney contemporaries, which seems a bit surprising to me. Lewis seems so much older.