The Horse and His Boy | Social Sensitivity

The Horse and His Boy Social Sensitivity

Much of The Horse and His Boy is concerned with dignity. Much of Shasta's journey from his fisherman's home to Anvard involves his learning his own self-worth and earning the respect of others. For Aravis, the process is somewhat more complex.

Hers is a culture in which women are commodities, pieces of property to be indulged, mistreated, and traded at the wishes of fathers and husbands. Aravis prays to a female deity for help, apparently not realizing that if women can be traded among men, the deity has been a very ineffective protector of women. Her rebellion is motivated in part by the man her father has chosen for her—the chief advisor to the Tisroc. To Aravis, the man is a sniveling sycophant and he is too old for her. How women are treated in Calormen may seem alien to some young readers, but there have been and...
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