Well, there don't seem to be any talking insects in Narnia. Also, no talking farm animals except for donkeys (and horses, I guess, depending on the breed.)

Very interesting topic and one I'd never really thought about! We are indeed explicitly told in The Magician's Nephew that when Aslan was selecting pairs of animals to become Talking Beasts, "Some sorts of animal he passed over altogether." So Lewis definitely had it in mind — at least by the time he'd nearly finished writing the series (MN was the second-last book to be published, and, I believe, the one he completed last) — that there were some species that were never granted the ability to talk. But as he doesn't tell us which ones, I guess it's all speculation...

I'm now remembering something that I actually thought of when I first read the entire series as a child (but it had slipped me until I started writing this post): I reckon that statement in MN, about Aslan missing out some kinds of animals, is in fact Lewis's get-out clause for the revelation in Prince Caspian that the mice of Narnia didn't become Talking Mice until they ate through Aslan's bonds on the Stone Table. PC was the second book Lewis wrote, a few years before MN, and at that time I would guess he probably hadn't yet thought much about Narnia's origin story, let alone decided to write it. So maybe, when he did start writing MN, he thought back to what Aslan told Reepicheep at the end of PC and realised that in order to be consistent, he'd need to state that there were some types of animal that weren't made into Talking Beasts right at the beginning.

... On the other hand, that would show a level of planning and consciousness of continuity issues that is famously absent in so many other aspects of the series, so maybe I'm asking too much there!!  But it's the best out-of-universe explanation that I can think of for why Aslan left some creatures out of that "Great Circle" in the first place.

Back to what other animals may have been excluded, apart from the mice... as far as I can remember, thinking through the whole series, just about every type of "dumb beast" that gets mentioned definitely has a talking counterpart. We know implicitly from HHB and explicitly from LB that there are non-talking wild lions — but in LWW we meet a Talking Lion other than Aslan. (Interesting, I've always thought, that we never hear of any other Talking Lions in the rest of the series — perhaps Lewis decided, after that first book, that having more of them would risk making Aslan seem less special and important. We certainly don't hear of any lions — talking or non-talking — being created in MN.)

Same with the relatively few other non-talking Narnian creatures that we hear of. Young Caspian in PC tries talking to the palace cats and dogs, which can't talk, and nor can the hunting hounds used by the giants of Harfang in SC — but in LB there are Talking Dogs (nice ones) and a Talking Cat (not a nice one... I always get the impression from Ginger that Lewis was not a fan of cats in general). I honestly can't think of any animals at all that are mentioned as "dumb beasts" without there being a clear indication that there are talking ones of the same kind.

Posted by: @aslanthelion

And are certain animals native to certain parts of Narnia? It would certainly explain the lack of elephants in the books outside TMN.

I didn't think of the elephants as an anomaly when I first read MN (as a 7-year-old), but you're right, they do stand out as something you definitely wouldn't expect to find in the natural environment of a land like Narnia, which has a very British / Irish feel to it. After their creation, did they move south towards the tropics? We know there's a great desert between Archenland and Calormen, which isn't a habitat for elephants (or many other living things), but maybe further south beyond that there are areas of savannah and/or rainforest where they could live — and maybe that's why we don't hear of them in the parts of the Narnian world that the other stories take place in? 

(On the topic of talking vs non-talking beasts, it's also interesting that during the creation scene in MN, Lewis notes that of the humps in the ground out of which the animals come, there were "two the size of cottages" — quite obviously the two elephants. So it seems only two of those were created in Narnia in the first place, and of course they both became Talking Elephants. Presumably this means there were never any non-talking elephants in Narnia or beyond!)

Posted by: @aslanthelion

For example, at the witch’s castle near the end of LWW, there’s mention of a kangaroo.

And now that you mention it, it's only just occurred to me that I've never even stopped to think of that kangaroo as being inconsistent with the mostly-British-style Narnian native fauna either. Possibly because I first encountered this story as a kid in Australia, so what could be more natural than kangaroos in Narnia???  

Posted by: @aslanthelion

By that logic, wallabies could also be talking beasts.

And koalas, and wombats, and possums, and echidnas and platypuses (if we've got the marsupials, may as well go for the monotremes too), and... I mean come on, we're never told any of those are not found in Narnia...  

Posted by: @col-klink

Also, no talking farm animals except for donkeys (and horses, I guess, depending on the breed.)

Not entirely true. In The Last Battle, there's a Talking Lamb, as well as a Talking Boar — not quite a farm animal in itself, but it's the wild ancestor of domesticated pigs, so that's close enough. There are definitely non-talking pigs in Narnia as well, as we hear of Dwarfs eating bacon in HHB and sausages in SC, and I'm sure there are one or two references to ham that I can't quite recall — and Coriakin serves cold lamb to Lucy in VDT, so there must be non-talking sheep as well. 

Aha, now this reminds me! I've got a copy of The Narnia Cookbook by Douglas Gresham — a collection of easy recipes for young cooks, all based on foods and meals mentioned in the Chronicles, and every recipe is prefaced with a quote from one of the books, usually referring to the kind of food involved. So I'm just now looking through that for some hints as to what kinds of animals are used as food in Narnia, and it turns out there are several kinds of poultry that we never hear mentioned as Talking Beasts...

Pigeons — "pigeon pie" and "breast of pigeon" are served in Underland in SC

Chickens — mentioned as food in PC and VDT

Turkeys — "hot roast turkey" gets a mention in SC

There are of course various Talking Birds in Narnia — Glimfeather the Owl, Farsight the Eagle, Sallowpad the Raven, and the unnamed Jackdaw in MN — but notably, they're all species that are not eaten by humans, whereas we never hear of any domestic fowl that can talk. So those are presumably among the creatures that weren't included in the Great Circle.

I've been looking for mentions of cows or beef, but interestingly, there don't seem to be any references to either — except that when Shasta has his meal with the Dwarfs in HHB, "hot milk" is served. So are there non-talking cows in Narnia, or does the milk come from some other farm animal? I don't think we're told anywhere.

Posted by: @courtenay

 

I've been looking for mentions of cows or beef, but interestingly, there don't seem to be any references to either — except that when Shasta has his meal with the Dwarfs in HHB, "hot milk" is served. So are there non-talking cows in Narnia, or does the milk come from some other farm animal? I don't think we're told anywhere.

Off the top of my head, the captured Telmarines in PC get served beef and beer.

And it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to eat a talking chicken or turkey (if any existed, much like the stag in SC)

It’s an interesting topic about what animals were “dumb beasts”. Well, I don’t believe CS Lewis specifically states. Though there were times that some of them started out as dumb then are rewarded to become talking beasts (like the mice) and some talking beasts that had turned into dumb beasts (like Ginger the Cat). 

And there was a time that according to the Timeline (which may not as well be canon) Aslan turned Calormenes in Telmar into dumb beasts for their wicked behavior. It’s possible that’s how dragons originally got to be in Narnia, since they’re not mentioned in The Magician’s Nephew. 

So I don’t believe CS Lewis never specifically states which animals were dumb. Though it is something to wonder about. 

Well, Courtenay, to answer your question about cows (in addition to the mention of beef that Starlit brought up…is that really the only mention?), we get this line in the final book:

There were fifteen Calormenes, a Talking Bull of Narnia, Slinkey the Fox, and Wraggle the Satyr.

So there are definitely talking bulls and cows in Narnia. 

Posted by: @aslanthelion

Well, Courtenay, to answer your question about cows (in addition to the mention of beef that Starlit brought up…is that really the only mention?), we get this line in the final book:

 

There were fifteen Calormenes, a Talking Bull of Narnia, Slinkey the Fox, and Wraggle the Satyr.

 

So there are definitely talking bulls and cows in Narnia. 

I did a search for "beef" in the Kindle Cloud reader and the word only appears twice - the one I already mentioned, and another time in PC when Bacchus's wine is "strong as beef".

Posted by: @starlit

Posted by: @aslanthelion

Well, Courtenay, to answer your question about cows (in addition to the mention of beef that Starlit brought up…is that really the only mention?), we get this line in the final book:

 

There were fifteen Calormenes, a Talking Bull of Narnia, Slinkey the Fox, and Wraggle the Satyr.

 

So there are definitely talking bulls and cows in Narnia. 

I did a search for "beef" in the Kindle Cloud reader and the word only appears twice - the one I already mentioned, and another time in PC when Bacchus's wine is "strong as beef".

That’s interesting. Cool you were able to search up the word. I’ve done that on Archive.Org before.

Posted by: @courtenay

but in LWW we meet a Talking Lion other than Aslan. (Interesting, I've always thought, that we never hear of any other Talking Lions in the rest of the series — perhaps Lewis decided, after that first book, that having more of them would risk making Aslan seem less special and important.

 

I’m glad he didn’t. Like you mentioned, it would make Aslan seem less special. And also, that one in LWW was annoying, imo.

I always assumed that the "little kangaroo" was one of the girls misidentifying some other animal. It was just too much out of place.

Both Lewis and Tolkien favored British woodland animals. I don't think there was a raccoon in any of their books (raccoons are New World) or a coyote. Both are very common in the U.S.

Posted by: @cobalt-jade

I always assumed that the "little kangaroo" was one of the girls misidentifying some other animal. It was just too much out of place.

Both Lewis and Tolkien favored British woodland animals. I don't think there was a raccoon in any of their books (raccoons are New World) or a coyote. Both are very common in the U.S.

That's an interesting argument. FWIW though, The Magician's Nephew does feature elephants, and The Last Battle has an ape. Those aren't very English. Still, the idea that the speaker of the kangaroo line in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe may have been mistaken is worth considering. (We don't know that it was Susan or Lucy since all the Narnians who had been turned to stone and then turned back were searching too. But it could have been.) After all, if the creature was stone, its species might be harder to identify, especially if were inside a dark room in the Witch's fortress.

Posted by: @cobalt-jade

I always assumed that the "little kangaroo" was one of the girls misidentifying some other animal. It was just too much out of place.

In all my copies of LWW, it's "poor kangaroo" — maybe it was changed for the American edition?

Anyway, I can't think of any British (or generally European) animal that could possibly be mistaken for a kangaroo — there's absolutely no wildlife here that even vaguely resembles kangaroos (or wallabies). All the large mammals here — and there aren't that many of them — are very well-known to just about everyone and there's nothing even slightly exotic about any of them. And if all Narnian wildlife naturally looks British or European, then why would either of the girls think "kangaroo", when that animal isn't a normal reference point for them? That doesn't make sense, unless of course the animal was a kangaroo.

I can't even think of any animals from other continents (say, Africa or Asia) that look enough like kangaroos that even an ill-informed Brit could mistake them for that. Kangaroos (trust me, I've seen quite a few) are very distinctive!!

Also, it boils down to what makes most sense in what we can assume about Lewis's intentions as an author. Why would he have one of the girls exclaim "Here's a kangaroo" — with no further qualification like "Oh, no it's not, it's some other funny-looking creature" — unless he wanted us, as readers, to accept that it was a kangaroo?

The thing is — as I know plenty of critics have pointed out — Narnia is a complete mishmash of all sorts of elements. It's not a world that Lewis planned out carefully (Tolkien-style) as to what creatures logically should be in it and what ones shouldn't. Fauns and centaurs don't belong to British folklore at all — they're from Greek mythology. (That's one of the particular things Tolkien objected to, and vehemently, when Lewis shared his work in progress with the Inklings.) And as @col-klink has said, the elephants in MN and the ape in LB are definitely not British. For that matter, Aslan as a lion is not native to Britain either, and nor are the leopards who are his retainers in LWW.

Basically, as far as I can see, the only logical conclusion is that kangaroos ARE found in Narnia, along with various other creatures that sticklers would argue "shouldn't" be there. I for one am fine with that.  

Another interesting topic I haven't given much thought to.

I feel sorry for the animals that were turned away in MN! I couldn't say which were, but it seems like many of the animals could potentially have dumb and talking versions?

I'm sad that Ginger was the one talking cat representation, reinforcing negative stereotypes of a cat's character! And the fact he got frightened back 'dumb' into the old land. That's one of the things I am not keen on from the Narnia stories, being as fond of cats as I am.

In all my copies of LWW, it's "poor kangaroo" — maybe it was changed for the American edition?

That was just my misremembering!

There were no talking reptiles in Narnia either, or amphibians. Reptiles I can see -- there's aren't too many in the British Isles -- but I think talking Toads would have been there just because Lewis had read and enjoyed The Wind in the Willows.