The Analysis Of Orual’s Self-redemption In Till We Have Faces

Till We Have Faces is the last work of Lewis, he exerts his utmost effort in this masterpiece which is highly estimated by readers all over the world. Lewis rewrites artfully the Greek legend between Cupid and Psyche, hoping to rescue the confused modern people. In this paper, main attention will be paid to the heroine of this masterpiece: Orual. The author takes Orual as an example to analyze the self-redemption in this masterpiece. Orual’s self-redemption can be divided into three steps, from the superficiality in cognition to the passivity in behavior, also the final thoroughness in spirit. Through the self-redemption in cognition, Orual realizes herself is Ungit who not only has an ugly appearance, but also has an ugly soul. With a feeling of resistance, Orual carries out her self-redemption in both dreams and reality respectively. In the dreams, Orual finishes all kinds of missions which are almost impossible for Psyche, this is also Orual’s atonement to Psyche; indirectly, this can be seen as Orual’s self-redemption as well. In the reality, astounded by others’ words, Orual becomes aware of her ignorance towards Redival and torture to Bardia, she begins to repent her life. At last, the god’s wordless judgment makes her realize her ridiculous obsession. Words are pale before the god and the god himself is the answer. Only when people take off the veil can they have the truth. There is only one step between human’s love and hatred, Orual’s self-proclaimed love hurts deeply the one she cares most unconsciously. Besides, she pursues obsessively the truth, and lets herself sink into “obsession”, which ruins herself, as well as people around her.This paper widens the research scope of Till We Have Faces, which is not only a theological work, but also a great literary work. Compared with other papers, the author focuses on self-redemption of this work, which is one of the three themes of this work, and studies thoroughly the redemption through the whole paper. From losing herself to finding herself, then to knowing herself finally, she accomplishes her self-redemption eventually. “Seeing is not believing”. The eyes can always cheat people. Besides, there should be no barrier between ration and belief, people should embrace all of them. What’s more, redemption is not just a religious term, it’s also crucial to ordinary people.