Pacifism, species alignment, and the Redwallers' self-awareness

[James Gryphon]

I've noticed that the main Redwall discussion forums have been quiet lately. When I was active the first time, I helped stir things up around here, but since my comeback, I haven't posted in them as much as I would have liked to. This topic, and the others that I hope will follow it, are intended to remedy that.

I had intended to write a long article on the Abbey's pacifistic tendencies and their gradual drift away from this, when it occurred to me, after thinking it through, that the Redwallers were never really pacifists. In fact, it seems to me that Redwall serves as a refutation by Mr. Jacques of the philosophy of pacifism. Think about it: at the beginning of the book, Abbot Mortimer says that "the day of the warrior is gone"; yet by the end of it, he's led the Abbey through a war, named Matthias the Abbey Warrior, and christened Martin's sword "Ratdeath". The Abbey survived by shrewd and determined resistance, not by being peaceful in the face of a dangerous enemy.

This theme continues in Mossflower. The Corim is primarily a fighting force, and is regularly led into battle by the warlike Skipper of Otters and Lady Amber. What's more is that this proves to be an effective means of overcoming tyranny. Abbess Germaine and her mice are the most peaceful of the group, but even they are not unwilling to oppose the Thousand Eyes Army and scout out Kotir. Finally, the Abbey is literally built on the site of a great military victory, and their number one hero is consistently referred to by the title "the Warrior". Although the Abbey Charter does not glorify violence, it prominently mentions self-defense near the end of its text.

Having grown up in the aftermath of the War, where the British nearly faced disaster because they were initially unwilling to defend their allies against the Germans, Mr. Jacques had an intimate understanding of the principle that if you give evil an inch, it'll try to take a mile. This reality is consistently reflected in the Redwall series.

While we've established that the Redwallers were never pacifists, it does seem clear that there was a gradual change in their actions over the course of the series. It seems to me that this was brought on by their increasing awareness of the book series' species alignments.

We know how the Redwall world is set up. Mice, squirrels, otters, etc. are good; rats, ferrets, weasels and stoats are evil. There are a few exceptions to this for the good creatures, but not many, and the gray "vermin" can be counted on one hand. In the first three books, the Redwallers were not aware of this, but as the rest of this post will attempt to show, they picked up on this trend after time.

In Redwall, the Abbey greets the rats peaceably, and only take action when it is obvious they are facing an invasion. In Mossflower, Martin is concerned for the well-being of the old searat on the beach (who, it turns out, was already dead before they ever laid eyes on him). In Mattimeo, the Abbey sees no problem with letting the "Lunar Stellaris" players inside, even though they are, to the readers, obviously vermin. It seems to me that the species alignments were initially created for the benefit of the readers, and that the characters were supposed to treat each other without this knowledge.

It's worth noting that the badgers see through this from the very beginning. Constance is opposed to interacting with vermin in both Redwall and Mattimeo, and you know, she turns out to be right. They couldn't be trusted. Boar the Fighter once said, "When rocks have crumbled to dust, vermin will still remain vermin", and this philosophy is repeatedly vindicated by the events in Outcast of Redwall, Salamandastron, and The Bellmaker, with the single exception of Blaggut. Practically every time a goodbeast trusts a vermin creature, they open themselves up to being stabbed in the back.

By Pearls of Lutra, it seems to have become evident that the good guys have mostly caught on to this and have grown tired of exposing themselves to being hurt by trusting vermin. When Graylunk came along, nobody trusted him because he's a weasel. (And if he hadn't been injured, they would have been right not to do so, because he was evil before being hurt.) From this point on, the good guys' willingness to tolerate vermin generally decreases, until they've gotten to basically the same point that the badgers started at -- whenever you see a vermin creature, grab your sword and get ready for a fight.

Ultimately, I would have liked to keep species alignment as a literary device -- not something that the characters themselves should be generally aware of. That said, I can understand the desire to keep the series from picking up the 'horror movie' cliche where the good guys consistently make dumb decisions that put themselves at risk. The only elegant way to resolve this would be to make it so that vermin species are not inherently bad, but that would have made the series more complicated than Mr. Jacques apparently wanted it to be. Redwall is meant for children, so perhaps it is best to regard this as a necessary simplification for the purpose of more easily reaching the book's intended audience.

I'd like to hear y'all's thoughts on all of this.

[Cornflower MM]

I'll let you know my thoughts when that has sink in......

[The Mask]

I think that's a very interesting story. The timeline was a bit iffy for me but the idea was very interesting.

[Wylder Treejumper]

Interesting indeed. However, it's not as if the vermin don't deserve it...

[James Gryphon]

As far as the timeline goes, that's because the progression is in publishing order, not chronological order. It's not that a few seasons after Mattimeo, Mattimeo or Martin II or somebody called everyone together and said "Let's not trust vermin anymore"  ;  rather, it was a change in how the good guys were portrayed that was made as Mr. Jacques wrote the series.

[Lutra]

James and the lengthy thoughtful posts are baaaack!

Anyway, I haven't read this deeply into the pacifist nature of the books.  When I look at it, the animals of Redwall, never were pacifists.  War was in their blood; they never trusted rats, or weasels or stoats.  That was true from the beginning.  The good vs evil was always there and conflict was always apparent.  Unless you look at a character like Veil (another topic for that) you never question that warriors are needed, fighting is needed, can there be such a thing as a "good weasel".  This just doesn't happen.  That's unfortunate given that the series could've been far more interesting in the long run had characters been less one-dimensional.  That's why I've stated before that I found Mistmantle to be a more enjoyable read over the five books that were written because there was no species alignment.  You weren't supposed to know beforehand who was on whom's side.  Its simply a product of writing, and that's what we were given.  There isn't a lot of room for out-of-the-box thinking in Redwall.

[The Skarzs]

This has been thought in the minds of Redwall readers all the time, though it seems to be overlooked by many. Despite the black/white stereotypes in Redwall, I still feel like there should be room for this philosophy: the amount of evil a person can do is equal to the amount of good they can do. Buuut. . . BJ wrote the books, and that's not what he wanted. It simplifies the stories for younger readers, and lets them more easily grasp the concepts of good versus evil; definite sides make it easier.
The pacifism of the Redwallers seemed to change from "Some vermin might be good" to "All are evil" rather quickly: probably between the span of two books. For peaceful creatures, it sure seems they want a fight, and that would certainly NOT make them pacifists.

[Tam and Martin]

Wow! Great post James!

I seem to probably see what you see. I believe they did become more aware that the villains really were villains. There was that divided category of bad guys and good guys and it was never really assumed that a good guy might be a bad one or vice versa.

I guess I will need to think about this a bit more.

[Romsca]

Yeah it seemed like the books became more simplified and black/white as the series continued

[rachel25]

That's a very interesting point James.

Yeah it seemed like the books became more simplified and black/white as the series continued

Yeah, I agree. Though at times I would have maybe liked a species that is usually betrayed as a good guy, to be a bad guy. But I guess I personally would have liked it to be a bit more complicated, but I understand why it wasn't.

[Izeroth]

 I think the level of pacifism the redwallers showed depended on what sort of beast the abbot was. If the abbot was cautious of vermin and knew they couldn't be trusted, the redwallers would probably act more aggressive to vermin. If the abbot was a pacifist, the redwallers would probably have been more kind to the vermin (until the vermin inevitably attack redwall).

Also, we have to take the recent events into account. If the abbey had recently been attacked, the denizens of redwall would (obviously) have an aggressive attitude toward vermin. If times were good, however, and redwall attacks were distant history, I doubt the redwallers would show much aggression to vermin at first.