Smashed out of Recognition
This is a great part in Perelandra where Ransom is climbing up from under the waters of the world. He has tried to strangle the Un-man, but something has followed him up into a giant, firelit chamber…
“Slowly, shakily, with unnatural and inhuman movements a human form, scarlet in the firelight, crawled out on to the floor of the cave. It was Un-man, of course; dragging its broken leg and with its lower jaw sagging open like that of a corpse; it raised itself to a standing position…and at that same moment [Ransom] became convinced… that the evil thoughts which had preceded the appearance of the enemy had been poured into his own mind by the enemy’s will. The knowledge that his thoughts could be thus managed from without did not awaken terror but rage. Ransom found that he had risen, that he was approaching the Un-man, that he was saying things, perhaps foolish things, in English. “Do you think I’m going to stand this?” he yelled. “Get out of my brain. It isn’t yours, I tell you! Get out of it.” As he shouted he had picked up a big, jagged stone from beside the stream. “Ransom,” croaked the Un-man, “wait! We’re both trapped…” but Ransom was already upon it.
“In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, here goes –I mean Amen,” said Ransom, and hurled the stone as hard as he could into the Un-man’s face. The un-man fell as a pencil falls, the face smashed out of all recognition.”
–From chapter 14 of Perelandra by C.S. Lewis
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