Eustace Scrubb

Biography

Eustace Clarence Scrubb was born in 1933 and is 9 years old in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and 16 by The Last Battle. He is introduced with the line, 'There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.' He is the only child of 'very up-to-date and advanced people' who send him to a progressive mixed school; he calls his parents Harold and Alberta by their first names. They are vegetarians, nonsmokers, teetotallers, pacifists, and wear special underclothes.

Much of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader follows his personal growth. Extracts from his diary show his skewed perspective: he describes fine weather as a perpetual storm and complains when Lucy is given Caspian's cabin, claiming that special treatment for girls makes them weaker. He imagines he can lodge a disposition at a British consulate and is beaten by Reepicheep for treating the mouse like a circus animal. On an unexplored island, he falls asleep on a dead dragon's hoard and transforms into a dragon due to 'greedy, dragonish thoughts.'

He suffers from Lord Octesian's arm bracelet, too small for a dragon's leg. As a dragon, he helps the crew find food, shelter, and a new mainmast. Reepicheep shows sympathy, and they become friends.

Themes

Writer Philip Hensher objected to the description of Eustace and his family, seeing it as evidence of anti-intellectual and anti-progressive leanings. In Lewis's essay The Abolition of Man, he argues that modern education produces 'men without chests,' and Eustace in his initial state is intended to be one of these. Lewis denied attacking intellect as such and argued for the scholastic belief that intellect is participation in the supernatural. He opposed purely fashionable progressivism and 'chronological snobbery.'

Portrayal

Eustace Scrubb has been played by three actors across different adaptations. David Thwaites took the role in the BBC television production, while Marco Williamson voiced him in the 2014 BBC audiobook dramatisations. Will Poulter portrayed him in the Walden Media film directed by Michael Apted. In that film, after Eustace becomes a dragon, he proves who he is to Edmund by flying to a spot where he has used his fiery breath to burn the words "I am Eustace" into the ground.

Lucy then helps remove the tiny bracelet that had been painfully tight since his transformation. As a dragon, Eustace earns the crew's respect by towing the ship through magical doldrums and later fighting a sea serpent on the Dark Island, where he is wounded. Aslan restores him to human form by scratching off the dragon's skin. Eustace's final act of redemption involves racing to place the seventh magic sword at Aslan's Table, which unleashes the swords' power to defeat the evil of Dark Island and save his friends.

The folk rock band The Oh Hellos included a song titled "The Lament of Eustace Scrubb" on their 2012 album Through the Deep, Dark Valley.