“They were sent to the house of an old Professor who lived in the heart of the country, ten miles from the nearest railway station and two miles from the nearest post office.”
Thank you for your Substack on C. S. Lewis and the Narnia books. I was reading your post of November 14 on the location of the professor’s house in LWW, and it got me thinking. I agree that it’s difficult to place the location of the house of the professor exactly, but as you write, the passage from LB definitely places the house in England, not Scotland. And Lewis’s life-long interest in northerness might also suggest northern England as a location.
Lewis’s imagination was certainly built from a combination of all of his experiences and his reading, so your placement of the house in northern England seems to make sense.
However, it’s difficult to say if Lewis had an exact location in mind or not. Operation Pied Piper, which was the government’s plan to relocate children from vulnerable areas in Britain during World War II, began in earnest on September 1, 1939. Oxfordshire was a designated reception area for evacuees, which accounts for the arrival of school girls to the Kilns on September 2. It’s unclear from his letters if Lewis was aware of other reception areas throughout England, but it’s possible. Both Hereforshire and Shropshire were designated reception areas for evacuees, and both border Whales, if my geography isn’t too far off. The reference to both mountains and heather in LWW might place the location of the professor’s house in one of these counties? What do you think?
Again, thanks for your Substack on Lewis. I’m very glad to see that the discussion of Lewis and the Narnia books is still alive and well.
Thank you for this very interesting suggestion. The letter I quoted to Arthur Greeves in 1941 mentions "all the country between Aberystwyth and Shrewsbury [in Shropshire]" and Lewis also gave the lectures which became 'A Preface to Paradise Lost' in North Wales in 1941. It's certainly an area he knew and admired, so a location in Herefordshire or Shropshire is certainly possible.
However, I think it's most likely that he was simply writing about the North and didn't want to pin down the exact location too precisely. It's certainly possible to argue that the whole Narnia series was a meditation on the North and northernness. "Narnia and the North!" is the running refrain throughout 'The Horse and his Boy', for example, and Mr Tumnus's Narnia recalls Nazi-occupied Norway, as I mentioned in an earlier post.
I've just one more thought to throw in: where does Mrs Macready fit in to all this? She's quite an intriguing character, though one we only meet in the first few pages of 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe'. If you (or anyone else) has any more ideas, I'd love to hear them!
Dear Mr. Peachey:
Thank you for your Substack on C. S. Lewis and the Narnia books. I was reading your post of November 14 on the location of the professor’s house in LWW, and it got me thinking. I agree that it’s difficult to place the location of the house of the professor exactly, but as you write, the passage from LB definitely places the house in England, not Scotland. And Lewis’s life-long interest in northerness might also suggest northern England as a location.
Lewis’s imagination was certainly built from a combination of all of his experiences and his reading, so your placement of the house in northern England seems to make sense.
However, it’s difficult to say if Lewis had an exact location in mind or not. Operation Pied Piper, which was the government’s plan to relocate children from vulnerable areas in Britain during World War II, began in earnest on September 1, 1939. Oxfordshire was a designated reception area for evacuees, which accounts for the arrival of school girls to the Kilns on September 2. It’s unclear from his letters if Lewis was aware of other reception areas throughout England, but it’s possible. Both Hereforshire and Shropshire were designated reception areas for evacuees, and both border Whales, if my geography isn’t too far off. The reference to both mountains and heather in LWW might place the location of the professor’s house in one of these counties? What do you think?
Again, thanks for your Substack on Lewis. I’m very glad to see that the discussion of Lewis and the Narnia books is still alive and well.
Yours
William Thompson
Thank you for this very interesting suggestion. The letter I quoted to Arthur Greeves in 1941 mentions "all the country between Aberystwyth and Shrewsbury [in Shropshire]" and Lewis also gave the lectures which became 'A Preface to Paradise Lost' in North Wales in 1941. It's certainly an area he knew and admired, so a location in Herefordshire or Shropshire is certainly possible.
However, I think it's most likely that he was simply writing about the North and didn't want to pin down the exact location too precisely. It's certainly possible to argue that the whole Narnia series was a meditation on the North and northernness. "Narnia and the North!" is the running refrain throughout 'The Horse and his Boy', for example, and Mr Tumnus's Narnia recalls Nazi-occupied Norway, as I mentioned in an earlier post.
I've just one more thought to throw in: where does Mrs Macready fit in to all this? She's quite an intriguing character, though one we only meet in the first few pages of 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe'. If you (or anyone else) has any more ideas, I'd love to hear them!