Eustace the Dragon-Boy

I was most intrigued in the “Voyage of the Dawn Treader” when Eustace was turned back into a boy. But why did Lewis have a young boy endure such a “beastly” experience? Was it so he could place a dragon scene somewhere in Narnia or did Lewis write this so we can make a comparison to our own lives?

I believe Lewis wrote this section for both reasons but mostly so we can make a comparison of Eustace’s life and our own. I see multiple parallelisms between the process of Eustace being changed and the testimony of a Christian. When Eustace explains the story to Edmund (which I find fitting since they both went through a major attitude check in Narnia), Aslan had first told Eustace to follow him. Eustace did not have a true picture of who Aslan was. He had heard stories of Aslan, but had never seen Aslan. However, Eustace trusted and followed. Just like Eustace, we’ve never seen God face-to-face. We’ve heard stories from the Bible, but haven’t received the physical sight of God, yet we believe and follow him.

Upon reaching the well, Aslan tells Eustace a peculiar thing: “undress first.” Eustace began to “undress” himself by peeling off his skin. Second parallelism: we, as Christians, are told to “Put to death therefore what is earthly in you…” (Colossians 3:5). We must also peel off our selfishness, greed, immorality, and anything else that is hindering us from being pure and holy. But what really did the skin that was being peeled off represent? Did peeling off the skin mean that Eustace wanted to put to death his old self and begin anew? But what of the act of Aslan peeling off the majority of layers? Was this to show that Aslan forgave Eustace or that Aslan had the power to help Eustace overcome his old self? Whether or not we can ever really answer these questions, we do know one thing: after that experience, Eustace was never really the same.