The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is the fifth volume of The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis. The Dawn Treader is a Narnian sail boat which belongs to Prince Caspian. Lucy and Edmund join him on this ship and end up going to the end of the world in it.
One of these days, you will have to sit down and read this book. Especially if you miss the seaside and it’s cold outside and you just got overwhelmed by wanderlust. It’s an adventure and most children will enjoy it, too.
We get introduced to Eustace – the Penvensies’ cousin. This vegetarian boy does not play nice, but with a little help from Aslan he turns his character around.
The spiritual lessons in this book abound, just like in the rest of the Narnia books. When Eustace becomes a dragon, he realizes his need to change his ways. He comes face to face with loneliness and is ready to do anything to have friends and show himself friendly.
When Aslan tells Eustace to scratch his dragon skin off, Eustace tries but under each layer he finds more scales and more dragon skin layers. Finally, Aslan says, “Let me do this for you.” He has Eustace lying on his back (a symbol of powerlessness) and performs the change for him.
Eustace’s becoming undragoned symbolizes the born-again experience. If you have not gone through it, you cannot understand it. Spiritual things are spiritually discerned. That’s just one story from the whole book to give you an idea of how things work in a book like Narnia.
At the end of the book, Lucy and Edmund are told they will never come back to Narnia ever again. Peter and Susan do not feature in this book, as each of them is doing something else for the summer, away from Eustace’s home where Lucy and Edmund are hosted.
Reepicheep, a giant mouse, provides lots of entertainment and lessons in bravery, too. I am not fond of mice and they seem to be everywhere in children’s literature. So far, Reepicheep is my favorite mouse from all the books we have read. I see a bit of myself in him, actually.
The light they ran into at the end of the world and the sea of water lilies provide more metaphors for the Christian walk. Overall, a deeply spiritual read, with lots of adventures and laughter in between.
