Perelandra continues the sometimes thrilling, sometimes mystical, but always sublimely evocative adventures of Dr.Ransom first explored in Out of the Silent Planet. In this second volume of C.S.Lewis’ acclaimed Cosmic Trilogy, Ransom is called to the beautiful paradise planet of Perelandra, or Venus, which is in grave peril from his old adversary Dr.Weston. Ransom encounters floating islands and bubble trees as well as an all-powerful female ruler, an Eve figure who undergoes temptation at the hands of Satan in the form of Weston. Ransom must engage with Weston in a desperate struggle to save the purity of Perelandra.

Ransom is transported between planets not by spaceship, as to Mars in Out of the Silent Planet, but in an eldil-borne wax coffin to the planet Venus, or Perelandra. Here the beautifully imagined floating islands on a golden ocean prove to be the scene for a revisitation of the temptation in Eden. Perelandra’s first-created Green Lady is the Eve figure to the amoral scientist Weston’s tempter and Satan figure. Weston has returned as a puppet of dark eldils to coax ‘Eve’ to disobey divine prohibitions, and Ransom has been sent to Perelandra to stop him. Ransom tries to argue the case for the defence of this Eden-like world, but the former Weston’s alternating persuasive skill and childish nastiness (eg. torture of animals) results in Ransom ultimately confronting and disposing of this “serpent” by means of physical violence. Perelandra remains unfallen, angels join in a celebration and Ransom returns to Earth healthier, wiser but wounded in the heel from his vicious fight with Weston.

Perelandra was first published in 1943, and again demonstrates the matchless imagination of the man who was later to create the Narnia books in delivering an exhilarating adventure which also attempts to answer some of life’s great mysteries. Lewis’ evocation of alien landscapes is rich and brilliantly imagined, demonstrating his flair as a craftsman of classic science fiction. The Cosmic Trilogy was inspired by Lewis’, then in his late thirties, involvement with an informal writing group known as the Inklings, which included his lifelong friend and fellow Oxford academic J.R.R.Tolkien. Not only are these books where Lewis first explored many styles to which he would return in his later, better-known fiction – from religious allegory, to the similarities between certain Venutian aliens and Narnian characters – but it is arguable that a cross-pollenation of ideas took place between Lewis and Tolkien: for example, the eldils could be said to be cousins to the elves of “The Lord of the Rings”.

Born and bred in Ulster but spending most of his life as an academic in Oxford, C.S.Lewis (1898-1963) is famous as the author of the Chronicles of Narnia (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and its six companion novels) which were published during the 1950s. He has been portrayed on stage, TV, film and radio by actors as diverse as Nigel Hawthorne, Joss Ackland, Anthony Hopkins (Shadowlands) and most recently Geoffrey Palmer (The Northern Irishman in C.S.Lewis). Less well-known is his lifelong friendship with another Oxford don, J.R.R.Tolkien; their informal writing group, the Inklings, was the spark that led to Lewis writing his highly-rated, but less well-known, science-fiction or “Cosmic” trilogy, comprising Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra (a.k.a.Voyage to Venus) and That Hideous Strength.

Alex Jennings, the reader, is one of the most acclaimed English stage, screen and radio actors of his generation.