BoM/TWS Message Forum

In the thread "A New Owner," talk has gone somewhat off-topic to discuss Stellae and ousiarchs and other things. I don't particularly care if it continues off-topic there, but I thought I'd break part of the topic off in its own thread, to make it visible to anyone who might be interested.

If you want to understand the magic associated with the Stellae, consult the book Planet Narnia  , which is where I got it.

It's a scholarly work (but highly accessible) that interprets C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia in terms of classical astrology. Basically, it says that each of the seven books is supposed to embody or exemplify the traits of one of the planets; as you're reading the book, you are supposed to feel what it is like to be under the influence of a particular planet. The author argues for this thesis by relating the imagery and motifs of the particular books to Lewis's own writings elsewhere about the planets of astrology (with which he was fascinated). So, for instance, The Silver Chair exemplifies the traits of the Moon, whose signal trait is, literally, lunacy: It's a planet associated with wandering wits and wandering feet. So it's a book whose characters go in and out of eclipse—becoming lost and forgetful—as they move through stony, frigid landscapes pocked with shallow, mirror-like pools and slushy snow.

When I brought Frank and Joe into the story, I wanted them to be skilled at fighting the occult, but wasn't sure who they were or what their skills were. I tentatively decided that I wanted them to have occult powers of their own, but wanted those rules to be consistent and rule-like, not arbitrary, like so much of the stuff in, say, Harry Potter, feels. I wanted a system. When I read Planet Narnia I had a "Eureka" moment, and took over the astrological system described therein and applied it to them.

To further acknowledge my debt, I took over the names of the seven classical planets from Lewis as well. The names Arbol, Viritrilbia, Perelandra, Sulva, Malacandra, Glundandra, and Lurga are the names he invented for the Sun, Mercury, etc., through Saturn, in his "space trilogy." I made up my own names and attributes for the trans-Saturnian planets. (TBH, Catalindria is the only one I'm really proud of and thinks works really well.) The seven classical planets, manifesting their attributes, make an on-page appearance in Lewis's That Hideous Strength.