The Problem of Susan

Fanfiction
Title:	The Problem of Susan
Author(s):	Neil Gaiman
Date(s):	2004
Length:	3029 words
Genre(s):
Fandom(s):	The Chronicles of Narnia
Relationship(s):
External Links:	https://talesofmytery.blogspot.com/2014/11/neil-gaiman-problem-of-susan.html
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The Problem of Susan is a 2004 short story by fantasy author Neil Gaiman. The protagonist, retired Professor Hastings (who strongly resembles an adult version of Susan Pevensie), deals with the grief and trauma of her entire family's death in a train crash as she is interviewed by a college literature student regarding her opinion on Susan's place in the Narnia books by C.S. Lewis.

Since the publication of Gaiman's story, "The Problem of Susan" has become widely used as a catchphrase for the literary and feminist investigation into Susan's treatment.

Context

In The Last Battle, the final book in the Chronicles of Narnia series, Susan Pevensie is the only one of the primary characters of the series to not die in our world and move on to Aslan's Country. She is described as having forgotten the world of Narnia, and given it up for caring about looks and social functions. Given the Christian allegorical nature of the series, she may be a stand-in for Judas Iscariot; however, on another level, she is a character like any other, and many fans have struggled with her treatment in the series. A significant amount of fandom discourse and fanfic examines whether Susan was truly a bad character, a realist, a victim of misogyny, multiple of the above, or something else.

Synopsis

Professor Hastings dreams about a battlefield reminiscent of the one in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. She wakes up, goes about her morning routine, and reads the obituaries, which report the death of a former lover from her youth. A young woman, Greta Campion, arrives to interview her. They begin by talking about how children's literature as a genre arose from a Victorian desire for sanitization and where their personal interests in it arose from. Hastings reveals that she lost her family in a train wreck, which reminds Greta of the Pevensies. Greta admits that she was never satisfied by Susan's ending and wonders if Susan did something really wrong which wasn't mentioned to deserve her fate. Hastings quietly seems to disagree and describes having to identify her siblings' corpses, then says she doesn't think she "can do any more of this today" but might another time. Greta leaves, believing they will never talk again. That night, Hastings dreams of reading a Mary Poppins book which was never actually published which includes going to a Christian Heaven, then dreams of her own obituary. Greta dreams of standing on the battlefield from LWW with her siblings, the White Witch, and Aslan. Aslan eats all of her except her head, so she must watch as he eats her sister, the witch eats her brothers, and the lion and the witch have sex before he eats Greta's head. She wakes up next to her boyfriend with the conviction that Hastings is Susan. It is revealed that Hastings died that night. The story ends with the last stanza from "The Poet Talks with the Biographers" by Clark Ashton Smith.

Reception

Impact

The term "The Problem of Susan" has become a general term for all analysis of Susan and her treatment. Meta written on the subject, such as The Problem of Susan by RJ Anderson, refers to it by that name, and it is a common tag in the fandom on Ao3.

"The Problem of Susan" has been made into a comic.

Links

• The Problem of Susan on TV Tropes
• The Problem of Susan (Narnia) tag on Ao3