5. Discuss how this chapter should be adapted. (ex. what do you most want to see, what problems do you see, etc.)From this chapter onwards, the production of the rest of SC is going to be of the utmost importance to the final result. One problem is how to make this production much better than the BBC TV
Silver Chair one. And we need to know how this new production will deal with this sensitive moment of the story. For example, how is Prince Rilian/Silent Knight going to be portrayed in his pre-silver chair state? The travellers do not immediately identify him, apparently because there is something a bit wrong with his face, quite apart from which he denies that he is Billions, Trillions or any other Rilian. The BBC TV version has him wearing some sort of aluminium combined mask and helmet, to enhance a grumpy expression, until he is freed from the ropes. Given that the BBC TV version was a low budget production making do with what was at hand at the time. What would this current production use?
I very much fear that this new alternative may well include the dreaded Green Mist, which will rear its ugly head once again.
Rilian will be not so much Silent Knight or even Black Knight as a green mist entity, enveloped in a loathesome green mist which will slowly dissipate until it is time for Black Knight to be tied into the Silver Chair, a most expensive piece of furniture, made out of those seven VDT swords, which turn out to have silver hilts, or complete silver swords, like that throne which featured in
Game of Thrones.
But for the comfort of the actor, one would hope it has lovely green upholstery along with green whoopee cushions, which will certainly emit a loathesome smell when Rilian destroys it with his own sword.
However, I think the silver chair is meant to be uncomfortable to sit in, at the very least. Cold, hard and prickly. The trouble is why does the chair have to be
silver? Or even silver-looking? If anyone wants an uncomfortable chair, a common, garden electric chair, with silvery metal fittings might do just as well.
Is it some sort of silver Throne of Judgement, where, via the news, one contemplates public opinion? Or is it meant to allude to money, commerce etc? Everything about this book suggests the moon, femininity, water and bathing, whether Jill and Eustace needing to wash at Puddleglum's wigwam, to the nice bath Jill enjoyed at Harfang, to the Black Knight's failure to indicate where the travellers can wash and refresh themselves.
Elsewhere on the forum, just to be helpful, I've suggested that somehow the enchantment on him reflects his thoughts onto the room's walls, especially what Rilian says
LOTGK plans to do with him, and that these reflections make his face harder to see, whilst the three Travellers learn what he and the Queen are up to. Gradually diminishing effects of this thought projection makes not only Rilian aware that his hour is upon him, but also the film's audience and the travellers as well get a better idea of what might be happening to him. Someone else might have better ideas.
If there is one criticism I've got of the BBC TV SC version is that there is too abrupt a transition from Rilian's enchanted state to the time he feels the fit is upon him and is tied into the Silver Chair. It isn't the way drugs, magic or any other means of control works, or even a disease, unless it is too deadly and fast-working for words, like the bite that killed Rilian's mother. When there is such an altered state of mind and body, I'd expect increasing physical pain, diminishing effects from what was being inflicted on him or maybe small, jerking fits, abstractedness whilst talking (forgetfulness, losing track of what he is saying) or increased restlessness. You don't just get up from a dinner table, claim that you are having some sort of problem, unless it is indigestion, submit without a struggle into being tied in a chair, silver or not, and then start claiming that everything you've said up to that point is absolute nonsense. Especially if you were watching the news whilst eating.
Another aspect of the BBC production was the violence displayed by Rilian in his enchanted state. Was that really necessary, even though it made the scene more dramatic?
And I'd like it established, somehow, just what the Silver Chair actually does. Reflect back to himself Rilian's true state of mind, since silver reflects? Or does it reflect LOTGK who stays with him in his nightly fit, and what LOTGK truly is? And how is it the means for Rilian's reenchantment? Does the silver, like other shiny silvery metals, conduct electric-like jolts of magic? Or is its sole purpose to restrain Rilian/not so Silent Knight in a most uncomfortable but expensive looking chair? What is the importance of silver, in particular?
Also, anyone got any ideas of why does LOTGK normally stay with Rilian whilst he is bound in the chair? I think, myself, when at the end of his session, when he allegedly turns into a snake, it is LOTGK in her snake form, reflected back to him, who bites him. Like other mythical creatures, including snakes and spiders, she may have more than one poison, some slow-acting and some deadly.
1. Lewis tells us: Puddleglum was thinking, "I wonder what game that witch is really playing with this young fool." Scrubb was thinking, "He's a great baby, really: tied to that woman's apron strings; he's a sap." And Jill was thinking, "He's the silliest, most conceited, selfish pig I've met for a long time." Which thought to agree with most and why? What do we learn about the characters based on their thoughts about the knight? Those comments made after the Black Knight has identified himself as being the same silent knight they saw near the Giant's bridge, also recall the three travellers' differing reactions to their Harfang lunch of Talking Stag. They also demonstrate the differing responses to LOTGK, his companion at the Giant's Bridge. Jill was the most forthcoming at that encounter, thinking how nice LOTGK was, and it was then she said p.74-5 my ed:
I expect he was shy... Or perhaps he wants to look at her and listen to her lovely voice. I'm sure I would if I was him.
But now she thinks he is the "silliest, most conceited, selfish pig I've met for a long time." Jill is a relative newcomer to Narnia, and is probably entranced by seeing the lovely clothes, horses and other aspects of a culture which in this story resembles strongly the historic culture of the Wars of the Roses, plus that of the troubadors and traditional ideas of "romance". And now she is being disabused of some of those romantic ideas. At least of "gallant, well-mannered and considerate", which Silent Knight is not. Jill is finding he is just as thoughtless as some of the Experiment House students, especially the bullies.
All those compliments Silent Knight pays LOTGK don't sound all that convincing, do they? Whatever one reads in romance novels, reality says that men as a rule behave somewhat differently towards women than how Silent Knight lauds LOTGK, saying how much she has done for him. And Eustace knows it, when he calls Silent Knight "a great baby, tied to LOTGK apron strings". Eustace has had a past history in Narnia, travelling with King Caspian and his two cousins, and was present when Silent Knight's parents met each other, though neither he nor Silent Knight can recognise this information. But I am sure he compares his new host to those male characters he met in VDT. Including Reepicheep, who "never stopped talking". And it is no accident that in previous chapters his is not the only reference to "babies", whether the Ettinsmoor Giants behaving like babies or the travellers' experiences in Harfang. Is Eustace perchance remembering his own pre-dragoning behaviour as well, do you think?
And then there is Puddleglum, a native Narnian who is asking all the proper questions, such as we, the readers, should also be asking. Or me, at any rate.
Such as: 1. "Why didn't he speak?" - referring to Silent Knight. Or... 2. "I wish we knew a bit more about her", on the same occasion. And now he is asking: 3. "I wonder what game that witch is really playing with this young fool."
Well might we be asking.
2. What does Scrubb mean by saying "It was the words of the sign?”Scrubb, being logical, and having finally learned the signs, himself, knows it is indeed the words of the sign. But by now, there may be others who have learned the words and who are trying to fool them. Or very likely those words might be the real deal? After all, they did meet the Black Knight after they crossed the Giant's bridge and very possibly he could have overheard them then, especially as Jill was quite free with what they were doing until Puddleglum shut her up. And it was Rilian who told the travellers that "under me" was part of a longer inscription that LOTGK already knew about.
3. The children and Puddleglum wrestle with whether or not to let the Knight free. Does this kind of wrestling happen in real life? What can we learn from it?Of course this kind of wrestling does happen in real life, usually when commanded to do something risky which may or may not lead to disastrous consequences, whatever course is taken. Such dilemmas happen, in war time, and sometimes in marriage as well as day-to-day occurrences. And there is the conflict between popular perception and prejudice and what is the best course to take. This kind of wrestling is so familiar thanks to the plays of William Shakespeare, and others, who wrote many plays about such moral dilemmas. Much depends on how these dilemmas are resolved. In fact, was C.S.Lewis alluding to William Shakespeare, when he described Silent Knight as being dressed all in black like Hamlet? And for both this unfortunate captive of the Silver Chair and Jill, in particular, was "To be or not to be" the real question?
And what is to be learned about such struggles? That when there is a serious moral dilemma then consequences of action or inaction should always be considered. Including the price of doing the wrong thing and doing the right thing.
Posted: Jun 25, 2017 6:51 pm