The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe Edmund steals away to the White Witch's castle, which is filled with statues of Narnian victims she has turned to stone. The Witch is furious when Edmund appears alone and angrier still to learn that Aslan may have returned. She takes him on her sledge to intercept the others. Meanwhile, Mr. Beaver realizes that Edmund has betrayed them, and they set off at once to seek Aslan at the Stone Table. As they travel, the Witch's spell over Narnia begins to break: Father Christmas (who has not been seen in Narnia for a hundred years) arrives with magical presents: a
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe resurrection, adding to the theme of Christianity throughout the novel. Due to labor union rules, the text of "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" was reset for the publication of the first American edition of by Macmillan US in 1950. Lewis took that opportunity to make the following changes to the original British edition published by Geoffrey Bles earlier that same year: When HarperCollins took over publication of the series in 1994, they began using the original British edition for all subsequent English editions worldwide. The current US edition published by Scholastic has 36,135 words. The story has been