The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

The seasons in Narnia are a recurring motif that represents the struggle between the opposing forces of good and evil. At first, Lucy Pevensie tumbles into the snowy woodland of Narnia and believes it is a magical paradise. The white snow holds connotations of purity and peace, but just as the snow covers the ground and obscures everything in sight, this pretty and wintery picture only disguises the realm’s more sinister goings-on. It emerges that the whole of Narnia is suspended in the White Witch’s icy grasp—an extension of her own white flesh, which is “not merely pale, but white like snow or paper or icing-sugar” (37). The Witch is a personification of death itself. Unlike Aslan, who can restore petrified creatures to life with his breath and is himself resurrected, the Witch’s power lies only in her ability to deprive others of life; she turns creatures to stone, she inflicts a severe winter that means nothing in Narnia can grow, and the continuation of her reign depends on her preventing the fulfillment of the ancient prophecy by killing at least one of the four siblings. Narnia’s unending winter therefore symbolizes death, scarcity, and stagnation; nothing can grow or change in Narnia.