OT: The Problem of Susan

Charles Reed · 02 Nov 2004, 06:57 · from 2004-November.txt.gz

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From: cmreed at link.com (Charles Reed)
Date: Tue Nov  2 06:57:26 2004
Subject: (urth) OT: The Problem of Susan
In-Reply-To: <BDA71D6C.4A0CB%adamsteph at earthlink.net>
References: <BDA71D6C.4A0CB%adamsteph at earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <4187A140.9000906 at link.com>

I've read Gaiman's THE PROBLEM OF SUSAN and have a few thoughts to share.  

SPOILERS abound, so be warned.

My initial reaction to the story was one of anger and disappointment, 
not so much at the story's visceral imagery as at Susan's lack of 
hope/redemption/salvation at the end.  The visceral imagery I mentioned 
was something that I actually liked quite a bit.  Well, "liked" isn't 
quite the right word.  Let's say I thought it was very effective in its 
attempt to pull the reader into the story.  The descriptions of the 
battlefield, of Aslan's copulation with the White Witch, and especially 
of what Susan endured after the train crash (and what she thought about 
it afterward) are all disturbingly powerful scenes.  Of course, it helps 
if you already have an emotional investment in the character, which I 
do, having been a big fan of the Narnia books ever since my fourth grade 
teacher -- Mrs. Pixler from Jane Long Elementary in Abilene, Texas if 
anyone's interested -- read THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE WARDROBE to 
us.  I don't know how emotionally resonant those scenes would be to 
someone not familiar with Susan Pevensie.

[Side note on Mrs. Pixler:  In addition to introducing me to Narnia, she 
also read parts of Stephen King's THE SHINING to us, which literally 
gave me nightmares and which planted within me a deep-seated distrust of 
topiary that I still can't quite shake.  All in all, though, Mrs. Pixler 
was cool, even though I'm sure if she were to read such stuff as obvious 
Christian allegories and nightmare-inducing horror to fourth graders in 
today's public schools, she'd have her pants sued off. :-) ]

Anyway.  Gaiman does a good job of using that pre-existing emotional 
investment to create a grown-up Susan that I was really interested in 
and cared about.  I think, however, that he (or more accurately, the 
grown-up Susan) misinterprets Lewis's (or Aslan's) reasons for not 
allowing Susan to go higher up and higher in.  Susan wasn't denied 
heaven because she liked lipstick and boys.  She was denied heaven 
because she turned her back on and denied the existence of the living 
God.  I desperately wanted some kind of redemption for her at the end, 
which I suppose is a testament to how much the story affected me.  I 
certainly can't say that I liked it, and its nightmarish bitterness 
really left me down in the dumps after reading it, but it is certainly a 
valid "take" on Susan.  All stories can't end happily and hopefully, and 
a consequence of Christian belief is the idea that some people will 
accept God's love and be saved while others will deny God's love and be 
damned.  Seeing that damnation in practice is a bitter thing, even when 
it applies to a person who exists nowhere but in the minds of those who 
have read about her.

Charles

Adam Stephanides wrote:

>The fantasy anthology FLIGHTS, which contains a novella by Wolfe (at least
>according to the editor, though the boundary between a novella and a
>novelette has never been clear to me) also contains a short story by Neil
>Gaiman, called "The Problem of Susan." In general I'm not keen on Gaiman as
>a writer, either of comics (I regard SANDMAN is overrated) or prose, but I
>think this story is a good one, though it functions more as a critique of
>the Narnia books than as a work of fiction in its own right. As it deals
>with issues which I know are of interest to several people on this list, I'm
>curious if anyone else has read it; and if so, what did you think about it?
>
>--Adam
>
>  
>

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