Perelandra

“Perelandra” has been a profoundly spiritual experience. C.S. Lewis masterfully draws parallels from the Bible to create a rich, allegorical narrative. His descriptions of settings and scenery are wonderfully vivid, making the world of Perelandra feel tangible and livable for readers. I have thoroughly enjoyed this series so far, with just one book left to go. Lewis’s ability to weave deep spiritual themes into an engaging and immersive science fiction story is truly remarkable.

Imaginative as the first one, lost me in some of his musings (grammatical gender and biological sex)

This book broke my brain. But it was very good.

I had read these books back in my teenage years, but had completely forgotten the stories, plotlines, and characters. My only memory that remained was a sense of “oddness” that rang true in this reading. Overall a “Meh” from me, which may not be fair. TBH, Perelandra was superior to Out of the Silent Planet and from what I understand, the 3rd installment is the best of the series, but after reading the first two back-to-back and seeing the length of #3 (That Hideous Strength), I just didn't feel I could jump right in. Something about this series is reminiscent of the Madeleine L'Engle books, though for some reason I enjoyed those much more.

This book was almost the reverse of Out of the Silent Planet for me, in which the beginning was dark but the book as a whole was not. In Perelandra, it starts off pretty quietly, with Ransom essentially being supernaturally transported (no actual space travel involved this time) to Perelandra, or Venus, and then about a third of the way through the book, something evil arrives. I personally find this kind of evil, the conniving and sinister type, to be the most disturbing and haunting. But although set in another planet, with wonderfully imaginative world-building, this book is ultimately an exploration of theology. I can't exactly say that I enjoyed the book, but it was intriguing and well done.

While this book was enjoyable, in particular in it's vivid descriptions of the planet Perelandra, and in the use of clever/entertaining metaphors as different kinds of life try to understand one another, I liked it significantly less than the first book in the series. It is far more directly allegorical, and while this did not turn me off of it (a lot of the theological discussions were very interesting), it made the plot feel quite predictable. Only in the final ending scene does the writing/plot get a bit lost in wordy theological discussion. An enjoyable read, but less exciting than the first book in the series (Out of the Silent Planet), which I would definitely recommend.

I did not like this book as much as Out of a Silent Planet. The World building and imagination is incredible. I still struggled to connect with the characters or to care about their situation. It reads more like a mythological story. I have conflicted feelings about the prevention of the fall of man. It's sort of a story about what would have happened if Adam and Eve would never have been kicked out of the garden of Eden this is not an easy question and bears some reflecting.

I apparently didn't understand a word of the end of this book. It's so thick of Christianity it's disgusting to me. One more Blessed Be He, and I'll put this book to DNF. (No, there's just a couple more pages left. But no 5 stars.)
And there it came.
Yada yada yada. sigh
It's f-ing worse than Cyrano de Bergerac's death!

This one was a lot more heavy-handed with the allegory than Out of the Silent Planet was. I enjoyed parts of it, while others dragged. Ultimately I think the first book was better, and more believable, especially, than the beginning of Perelandra.

Liked the first one much more than I liked this one in the series. I'm still interested to see what the last book of the trilogy holds.

Short Review: what if there was someone to help Eve and stop the fall? Lewis at one of his best. In Perelandra, Professor Ransom is taken from Earth to Venus because he is being called. Once there he meets a green woman that is one of two people on the entire planet. Later Weston (from the previous book) comes and tries to tempt the woman to do what she knows she is not to do. Fascinating book, I enjoyed it more than the previous book From the Silent Planet.

click through for the full review on my blog at http://bookwi.se/perelandra/

This is one of my all-time favorite books by Lewis!

I read it for the first time in 2003 in my college course on the fiction of C. S. Lewis.

Favorite quotes:

“On the contrary, it is words that are vague. The reason why the thing can't be expressed is that it's too definite for language.”

“Words are slow.”

“Were all the things which appeared as mythology on Earth scattered through other worlds as realities?”

“at that moment he had a sensation not of following an adventure but of enacting a myth.”

“He remembered his old suspicion that what was myth in one world might always be fact in some other.”

“Or were the old myths truer than the modern myths? Had there in truth been a time when satyrs danced in the Italian woods?”

“Inner silence is for our race a difficult achievement. There is a chattering part of the mind which continues, until it is corrected, to chatter on even in the holiest places.”

“Long since on Mars, and more strongly since he came to Perelandra, Ransom had been perceiving that the triple distinction of truth from myth and of both from fact was purely terrestrial—was part and parcel of that unhappy division between soul and body which resulted from the Fall. Even on Earth the sacraments existed as a permanent reminder that the division was neither wholesome nor final. The Incarnation had been the beginning of its disappearance. In Perelandra it would have no meaning at all. Whatever happened here would be of such a nature that earthmen would call it mythological. All this he had thought before. Now he knew it. The Presence in the darkness, never before so formidable, was putting these truths into his hands, like terrible jewels.”

“in the very matter of our world, the traces of the celestial commonwealth are not quite lost. Memory passes through the womb and hovers in the air. The Muse is a real thing. A faint breath, as Virgil says, reaches even the late generations. Our mythology is based on a solider reality than we dream: but it is also at an almost infinite distance from that base. And when they told him this, Ransom at last understood why mythology was what it was—gleams of celestial strength and beauty falling on a jungle of filth and imbecility.”

““Farewell, Friend and Savior, farewell,” said both voices. “Farewell till we three pass out of the dimensions of time. Speak of us always to Maleldil as we speak always of you. The splendor, the love, and the strength be upon you.””