Similarities Between Out Of The Silent Planet And Narnia

Out of the Silent Planet is a Science Fiction novel written by C.S. Lewis. This genre of writing holds a mix of different and similar characteristics as Lewis’ Narnia books. Differences including direct mentioning of religion, and similarities such as the narrating style. These show that though it is a different genre Lewis still leaves similar pieces in each book or set of books.

A major difference in Out of the Silent Planet compared to the Narnia novels is the direct religious references. In Narnia because it is not a religious allegory there are few a direct references to religion. Direct meaning characters praying, mentioning God or mentioning anything religious in general. These direct references to religion come up several times in

Out of the Silent Planet, mainly involving Ransom praying. Ransom prays during the books multiple times such as “nursed his bruised limbs and prayed for the end,” and “he prayed fervently that there might be only one.” Both of those were in situations of hardship or distress. In Narnia the only thing that could be considered as praying is when Lucy whispers to Aslan saying in one such instance “Aslan, Aslan if you ever loved us at all please send us help now.” Though this is also during a moment of distress it is not referred to as praying to Aslan. Therefore, it cannot be categorized as direct reference to religion. Religion not only comes up in prayer, but also when Ransom encounters the hrossa. While learning about these creatures Ransom, after hearing the word séroni, thinks about hrossa’s religion at one point saying, “perhaps hrossa had a mythology—he took it for granted they were on a low cultural level— and the séroni were gods or demons.” This thought process about another cultures gods happens to a point with the Calormenes’ Tash in The Last Battle, the talking animals discuss how the Calormenes worship him stating, “They have a god called Tash… They kill men on his altar.” Though Aslan is a big part of Narnia and it seems that he is the Narnians’ Tash he is never referred to that way, so he in itself is not a direct reference to religion. This difference is something that would seem deliberate especially leaving out religious references in the Narnia books because they are not a religious allegory.
A similarity that Lewis seems to use is that in both Out of the Silent Planet and the Narnia books there is the same type of storyteller narrator.

Lewis either breaks the fourth wall to mention the books in general or to comment to the audience. By commenting to the audience in both books it gives sort of this storyteller feel to it. This comes up in Out of the Silent Planet as the narrator says, “as anyone who has ‘kept house’ will understand, he found that his preparations for the morning had been even more incomplete than he supposed.” It also comes up in the Narnia books several times such as, “It was his own fault, and you can read about it in the other book.” The narrator also achieves the storyteller style in Narnia when he refers to himself saying, “I never heard of a dwarf who was a fool.” It becomes a sort of storyteller narration because he is adding on to the story as if he was telling to you right then and there. This narration also comes up when he mentions his book that the reader is currently reading. In Out of the Silent Planet the narrator says, “bearing on the events recorded in this book or whether it was merely an irresponsible dream.” This also happens in the Narnia book several times. Since Narnia is a children’s book it makes since that the story is a storyteller narrator because keeps the storytelling that children are used to from other figures in there life. Now Out of the Silent Planet is not written for a child audience so why does the narrating style stick. It could be purely accidental or it could be that Lewis did it on purpose for this book as well. Either way it shows that authors can employ the same writing techniques in vastly different

books.
How an author writes a story usually differs vastly based on the genre of that book. Though many times certain styles stick. Whether it’s because the author enjoyed that style or something else entirely, it causes many of the authors works to have a certain quality surrounding it.