While magic is obviously a major theme in The Magician’s Nephew, magic isn’t a singular force. The story’s two prominent forms of magic can be summed up as destructive—motivated by the quest for power, even at the expense of other human beings—and creative, which is motivated by the desire for other beings to flourish. The protagonists, Digory and Polly, first encounter destructive magic when Digory’s Uncle Andrew, in a selfishly reckless act, transports the children to magical lands using mysterious rings. In Charn, one of the magical kingdoms they explore, the children meet Queen Jadis (later simply called “the Witch”), who is a far more hardened, ruthless, and deadly practitioner of destructive magic than Andrew. When all four characters encounter King Aslan in the kingdom of Narnia, however, they witness the goodness wrought by creative magic. By contrasting these two forms of magic, C. S. Lewis suggests that wickedness manifests in using others for one’s own purposes, while goodness is rooted in a desire for others to flourish, even at a cost to oneself.
Destructive magic rests on self-centeredness. When Uncle Andrew explains that he broke his promise to destroy the magic passed down to him by his godmother, Mrs. Lefay, he defends himself by saying, “You mean that little boys ought to keep their promises. […] But of course you must understand that rules of that sort, however excellent they may be for little boys […] can’t possibly be expected to apply to profound students and great thinkers and sages. No, Digory. Men like me, who possess hidden wisdom, are freed from common rules [.]” Andrew thinks, in other words, that everyday rules about honor and decency don’t apply to him; they’re for “lesser” people, like children. Digory, however, quickly sees through his uncle’s words: “‘All it means,” he said to himself, “is that he thinks he can do anything he likes to get anything he wants.’” By having Digory see through his uncle’s claim that he’s an exception to ordinary rules, Lewis demonstrates that even children are capable of recognizing the costs of “destructive” magic—thereby implying that creative magic is innocent, and everything that its destructive counterpart isn’t.
Because destructive magic is self-centered, those who practice it see other human beings as things to be used for one’s own purposes, and thus ultimately dehumanize others. In Queen Jadis, the children find someone like Uncle Andrew, but even more sinister. She claims that the destruction of Charn was her sister’s fault: “She drove me to it […] Her pride has destroyed the whole world […] She even knew that I had the secret of the Deplorable Word. Did she think—she was always a weakling—that I would not use it?” Jadis refuses to take responsibility for her own destructive actions, using her unnamed sister as a convenient scapegoat for her own decision to destroy Charn. Her flippant, self-justifying use of magic suggests that she’s grown accustomed to blaming others. When Polly protests, “[What about] all the ordinary people […] who’d never done you any harm,” Jadis retorts, “Don’t you understand? […] I was the Queen. They were all my people. What else were they there for but to do my will?” When the children refuse to accept this reasoning, she goes on, “You must learn, child, that what would be wrong for you or for any of the common people is not wrong in a great Queen such as I […] We must be freed from all rules. Ours is a high and lonely destiny.” Jadis’s words show that she sees her people as objects for her own use, and she echoes Uncle Andrew by saying that people like her are not bound by rules. But she is worse than Uncle Andrew—where Andrew was bad enough, the Queen has traveled so far down the path of destructive magic that she willingly wipes out other people, even her own subjects, in order to maintain power. She is so obsessed with her own superiority that she no longer thinks about others’ humanity.
Though destructive magic is more prominent in the first half of the book, the characters’ encounter with creative magic through Narnia’s King Aslan puts destructive magic in perspective. While Digory and Polly listen joyfully to Aslan’s voice singing Narnia into existence, Uncle Andrew and the Witch react very differently: “Uncle Andrew’s mouth was open too, but not open with joy. […] He was not liking the Voice. If he could have got away from it by creeping into a rat’s hole, he would have done so. […] [The Witch’s] mouth was shut, her lips were pressed together, and her fists were clenched. Ever since the song began she had felt that this whole world was filled with a Magic different from hers and stronger. She hated it. She would have smashed that whole world, or all worlds, to pieces, if it would only stop the singing.” This passage suggests that people’s character shapes their reactions to Aslan’s creative magic. Both Uncle Andrew and the Witch feel a desire to flee from Aslan’s singing, but the Witch, provoked by its superior power to create, goes so far as to wish to destroy the magic as its source, as well as everything the singing brings about. The Witch’s reaction to Aslan’s singing sets up a conflict that isn’t fully resolved in The Magician’s Nephew, but is further explored in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe (of which this story is a prequel). In the (chronologically) later volume, there is a direct confrontation between the conflicting magics introduced here. Aslan hints at that confrontation, however, when he remarks to the Talking Beasts he’s created that evil will come of the Witch entering Narnia, but that when it arrives, Aslan “will see to it that the worst falls upon myself.” This reinforces Lewis’s depiction of Aslan as the one who, in contrast to the Witch, enables others’ flourishing, even—eventually—at cost to himself.
Related Themes from Other Texts
Creative Magic vs. Destructive Magic ThemeTracker
Creative Magic vs. Destructive Magic Quotes in The Magician’s Nephew
“Rotten?” said Uncle Andrew with a puzzled look. “Oh, I see. You mean that little boys ought to keep their promises. Very true: most right and proper, I’m sure, and I’m very glad you have been taught to do it. But of course you must understand that rules of that sort, however excellent they may be for little boys—and servants—and women—and even people in general, can’t possibly be expected to apply to profound students and great thinkers and sages. No, Digory. Men like me, who possess hidden wisdom, are freed from common rules just as we are cut off from common pleasures. Ours, my boy, is a high and lonely destiny.”
What it said was something like this—at least this is the sense of it though the poetry, when you read it there, was better:
Make your choice, adventurous Stranger;
Strike the bell and bide the danger,
Or wonder, till it drives you mad,
What would have followed if you had.
“No fear!” said Polly. “We don’t want any danger.”
“Oh but don’t you see it’s no good!” said Digory. “We can’t get out of it now. We shall always be wondering what else would have happened if we had struck the bell. I’m not going home to be driven mad by always thinking of that. No fear!”
“It was my sister’s fault,” said the Queen. “She drove me to it. May the curse of all the Powers rest upon her forever! At any moment I was ready to make peace—yes and to spare her life too, if only she would yield me the throne. But she would not. Her pride has destroyed the whole world. Even after the war had begun, there was a solemn promise that neither side would use Magic. But when she broke her promise, what could I do? Fool! As if she did not know that I had more Magic than she! She even knew that I had the secret of the Deplorable Word. Did she think—she was always a weakling—that I would not use it?”
“But the people?” gasped Digory.
“What people, boy?” asked the Queen.
“All the ordinary people,” said Polly, “who’d never done you any harm. And the women, and the children, and the animals.”
“Don’t you understand?” said the Queen (still speaking to Digory). “I was the Queen. They were all my people. What else were they there for but to do my will?”
“It was rather hard luck on them, all the same,” said he.
“I had forgotten that you are only a common boy. How should you understand reasons of State?”
There was no doubt that the Witch had got over her faintness; and now that one saw her in our own world, with ordinary things around her, she fairly took one’s breath away. In Charn she had been alarming enough: in London, she was terrifying. For one thing, they had not realized till now how very big she was. […] But even her height was nothing compared with her beauty, her fierceness, and her wildness. She looked ten times more alive than most of the people one meets in London. Uncle Andrew was bowing and rubbing his hands and looking, to tell the truth, extremely frightened. He seemed a little shrimp of a creature beside the Witch. And yet, as Polly said afterward, there was a sort of likeness between her face and his, something in the expression. It was the look that all wicked Magicians have, the “Mark” which Jadis had said she could not find in Digory’s face.
I think (and Digory thinks too) that her mind was of a sort which cannot remember that quiet place at all, and however often you took her there and however long you left her there, she would still know nothing about it. Now that she was left alone with the children, she took no notice of either of them. And that was like her too. In Charn she had taken no notice of Polly (till the very end) because Digory was the one she wanted to make use of. Now that she had Uncle Andrew, she took no notice of Digory. I expect most witches are like that. They are not interested in things or people unless they can use them; they are terribly practical.
“Now, Missie, let me get at ’is ’ead, and just you get off. You’re a Lidy, and you don’t want all these roughs going for you, do you? You want to go ’ome and ’ave a nice cup of tea and a lay down quiet like; then you’ll feel ever so much better.” At the same time he stretched out his hand toward the horse’s head with the words, “Steady, Strawberry, old boy. Steady now.”
Then for the first time the Witch spoke.
“Dog!” came her cold, clear voice, ringing loud above all the other noises. “Dog, unhand our royal charger. We are the Empress Jadis.”
Then two wonders happened at the same moment. One was that the voice was suddenly joined by other voices; more voices than you could possibly count. They were in harmony with it, but far higher up the scale: cold, tingling, silvery voices. The second wonder was that the blackness overhead, all at once, was blazing with stars. They didn’t come out gently one by one, as they do on a summer evening. One moment there had been nothing but darkness; next moment a thousand, thousand points of light leaped out—single stars, constellations, and planets, brighter and bigger than any in our world. There were no clouds. The new stars and the new voices began at exactly the same time. If you had seen and heard it, as Digory did, you would have felt quite certain that it was the stars themselves which were singing, and that it was the First Voice, the deep one, which had made them appear and made them sing.
But the Witch looked as if, in a way, she understood the music better than any of them. Her mouth was shut, her lips were pressed together, and her fists were clenched. Ever since the song began she had felt that this whole world was filled with a Magic different from hers and stronger. She hated it. She would have smashed that whole world, or all worlds, to pieces, if it would only stop the singing.
“That’s it! Stupendous, stupendous,” said Uncle Andrew, rubbing his hands harder than ever. “Ho, ho! They laughed at my Magic. That fool of a sister of mine thinks I’m a lunatic. I wonder what they’ll say now? I have discovered a world where everything is bursting with life and growth. Columbus, now, they talk about Columbus. But what was America to this? The commercial possibilities of this country are unbounded. Bring a few old bits of scrap iron here, bury ’em, and up they come as brand new railway engines, battleships, anything you please. They’ll cost nothing, and I can sell ’em at full prices in England. I shall be a millionaire. And then the climate! I feel years younger already. I can run it as a health resort. A good sanatorium here might be worth twenty thousand a year. Of course I shall have to let a few people into the secret. The first thing is to get that brute shot.”
“Creatures, I give you yourselves,” said the strong, happy voice of Aslan. “I give to you forever this land of Narnia. I give you the woods, the fruits, the rivers. I give you the stars and I give you myself. The Dumb Beasts whom I have not chosen are yours also. Treat them gently and cherish them but do not go back to their ways lest you cease to be Talking Beasts. For out of them you were taken and into them you can return. Do not so.”
“But we’re not quite as bad as that world, are we, Aslan?”
“Not yet, Daughter of Eve,” he said. “Not yet. But you are growing more like it. It is not certain that some wicked one of your race will not find out a secret as evil as the Deplorable Word and use it to destroy all living things. And soon, very soon, before you are an old man and an old woman, great nations in your world will be ruled by tyrants who care no more for joy and justice and mercy than the Empress Jadis. Let your world beware.”
