Going to Fairyland

David Jasper points out that in George MacDonald's fantasy, Phantastes, "Fairyland is not so much the goal of the traveller's quest as the location of the spiritual journey which itself enables the quester to perceive something of the truth in God." (The Cambridge Companion to C. S. Lewis, 224)

Certainly C. S. Lewis learned that truth from MacDonald; so he wrote the exchange between Aslan and Lucy and Edmund near the end of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. As the children realize they are about to return to their world Lucy says, "It isn't Narnia, you know, it's you. We shan't meet you there. Aslan responds, "But you shall meet me, dear one." So Edmund asks, "Are—are you there too, Sir?" Aslan replies, "I am. But there I have another name. you must learn to know me by that name. That was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little while, you may know me better there."

So there are many examples of characters in fantasy literature going into a fairyland where they "perceive something of the truth of God" and lead us to do the same. I'll suggest a few in this post.

First, I think of the members of the Fellowship entering Lothlόrien in Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring (Chapters VI - IX). One could spend days or weeks mining the golden truths the questers received from Galadriel and others in her realm.

Then there's Smith in Tolkien's short story, Smith of Wootton Major. If you haven't read that glorious little story in a while, or at all, I urge you to spend an hour or so allowing Tolkien to mesmerize you. On second thought, it may take you longer if you linger on some of the glorious descriptions of the world of faery.

Don't forget George MacDonald's short fairytale The Golden Key that I believe is in the background of Lewis's glorious ending of The Last Battle. And of course there's MacDonald's other children's fairy tales, The Princess and the Goblin and The Princess and Curdie.

You can't stay in the faery-world forever you know. You have to come back and live in this world. But once you have experienced God there you will be enabled to see Him here.