THE ARCHETYPE OF THE PRODIGAL SON IN C. S. LEWIS’S THE PILGRIM’S REGRESS AND GEORGE MACDONALD’S LILITH
THE ARCHETYPE OF THE PRODIGAL SON IN C. S. LEWIS’S THE PILGRIM’S REGRESS AND GEORGE MACDONALD’S LILITH

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this paper is to analyse how the biblical archetype of the prodigal son is expressed in C. S. Lewis’s allegory The Pilgrim’s Regress and George MacDonald’s novel Lilith by highlighting the extent to which the writers kept the archetype undisplaced or slightly displaced it with their own literary additions. The prodigal son, either as John or as Mr. Vane, is the one that rejects the help of a Messianic character, usually out of pride. He is a rebel in quest of something greater than he has, but he only realises towards the end of his journey what a treasure he has lost. His salvation is only in the form of a death of the ego, which in Lewis’s understanding would be “the cure of death” and in MacDonald’s “the gate to Life”.

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