Out of the Silent Planet: book review #10

C.S. Lewis, a professor of English literature at Oxford and Cambridge Universities, is better known as author of The Chronicles of Narnia, and of science-fiction. This present review is of the first novel in his space trilogy.

A British physicist, Dr. Weston, has developed a spacecraft capable of interplanetary travel, and has recently returned from his first journey to Mars. He has brought back gold, and believes he can get untold amounts of it if he can provide a human sacrifice for the the Martians he encountered. He and a colleague have now kidnapped a Dr. Ransom, a hiker on vacation in the English Midlands, and taken off on a second trip to Mars. On arrival after a month-long journey, the two hold Ransom at gunpoint as a group of Sorns, ungainly tall inhabitants of this low-gravity planet, approach through the shallow waters of a nearby bay.

The meeting of the two groups, Sorn and Men is interrupted by the torpedo-like attack of some sort of water creature. Ransom breaks free from Weston and flees into what passes as forest on Mars, running as fast as the uneven ground will allow. He is now alone, exhausted, disoriented, without food or defense in a totally unfamiliar environment, in fear of what the forest may contain, not even knowing what is safe to eat or drink.

He loses track of time; perhaps a day or two has passed when about ten yards away at a river's edge, a black creature emerges, furry, short legs, flat tail, rather like a seven-foot tall beaver. It is making sounds like it is talking, but is not yet aware of Ransom. When Ransom rises from where he had been hiding, the creature leaps backward, stops and watches him. The wariness is mutual, but gradually the two approach each other. The creature slaps its chest. “Hross,” it says. “Hross.”

“Hross,” repeats Ransom and points at it; then “Man,” he says, slapping his own chest.

“Hma—hma—hman,” imitates the hross.

Ransom pantomimes eating. The hross understands, and beckons him to follow it to a small boat hidden among the reeds. It gets into the boat, gets out and points at the boat, an obvious invitation to Ransom, who complies. They travel downstream several miles, finally arriving at a hrossa village,where Ransom is an object of much interest to both the adults and the children. He lives among them for many weeks, learning the customs, the language, the agriculture. He learns that there are three intelligent species on the planet, all living in the deep valleys; the planet's surface highlands lack warmth and air enough to support life.

Ransom's peaceful life changes the day several villages join in a hnakra hunt—the hnakra being the aquatic predator Ransom saw on his first day on Mars, an armored creature vulnerable only through its open mouth. Spear-armed hrossa in a hundred boats are deployed over the water, each hoping to win the prize. Ransom's friend and mentor, Hyoi, sharing his boat with Ransom, suddenly says, “There is an eldil coming to us over the water.” Ransom can see nothing, but he hears a voice coming out of the air just above him:

“The Man with you, Hyoi. He ought not to be there. Bent men are following him; he should go to Oyarsa. If they find him anywhere else, there will be evil.”

Ransom, excited with the hunt, thinks there will be time for going somewhere after the hunt, and indeed it is he and Hyoi who kill the hnakra. While everyone is celebrating, a rifle shot is heard, and Hyoi falls, mortally wounded.

Other hrossa advise Ransom that when Oyarsa summons, one must respond immediately. The way to Meldilorn, the planet's capital, would take five days, going by the valley, but there is a shortcut, they instruct him. It follows a trail over the mountains, where the sorn who live in caves will guide him. Start immediately!

Stricken with guilt over his friend's death, and with fear for his own life knowing that Weston is in close pursuit, Ransom obeys their instructions. He follows the base of the mountain, alone and expecting another bullet at any moment. He finds the beginning of the shortcut and begins his ascent. All his old fears from his arrival on the planet assail him, but he steels his resolve to reach Medilorn on the other side of the heights. The air is much thinner and colder; dark is coming on. Exhausted, he sees a single light in the darkness farther on. Does it mean shelter, or is it an outpost of the Sorns to whom Weston wants to sell him?