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“I’m a beast, I am, and a Badger, what’s more. We don’t change. We hold on.”
This is Trufflehunter in CS Lewis’s Prince Caspian, explaining to Nikabrik the dwarf why they must protect Caspian and restore him to his rightful throne: “Narnia was never right except when a son of Adam was King.”
Yesterday morning I was listening to Numbers chapter 4 and noticed how often badgers’ skins were mentioned. Over and over, as the tabernacle and its contents are described, it mentions a covering of badgers’ skins—seven times, in fact.
It’s not an accident that Trufflehunter and Mr Badger (from The Wind in the Willows) are the way they are. They endure. They protect the holy things.
My youngest and I are reading through the Wind in the Willows right now and I was wondering if there is some badgeryness that both Lewis and Grahame are emulating in their characters. Mr. Badger seems a bit more rough than Trufflehunter to me at first, but only at first. It would be interesting to ask the authors what was their inspiration for their badger characters.
ReplyDeleteI think there must be -- or at least that Lewis is imitating Greene, because I know he loved The Wind in the Willows. Mr Badger has been one of my favorite characters ever since I first met him reading that book in the sixth grade, and I didn't even like the book. :-p
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