History Literature / ThePilgrimsRegress

* {{Allegory}}: In spades! Despite some critics saying that ''Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia'' is "allegorical," by the way, this book is the only proper allegory Lewis wrote (''Narnia'' is {{applicability}}).

* BoringReturnJourney: {{Played with}}. After John's conversion, he realizes that the only way to reach his island was east of his old home, and he's been traveling roughly west for his entire journey (hence the word "regress" in the title). The narrative doesn't skip over John's return journey, but it's much shorter (both in time and in number of pages) than the trip out. Heading west, John had wandered and meandered quite a bit, but heading east, he sticks to the straight and narrow path to his destination. And on the trip back, he finds the landscape has completely changed--or rather, because of his conversion, he sees the world as it truly is for the first time.

--->"What am I to do?" said John.\\

* ItsAllAboutMe: For all his playing the genial host, Mr. Sensible is quite self-absorbed. FridgeHorror sets in when reading his line about hoping for mechanical servents and[=/=]or "a race of peons who will be psychologically incapable of [revolt]", and realize he'd fit right in in [[Literature/TheStepfordWives Stepford]].

* PopculturalOsmosisFailure: In the preface to the third edition, Creator/CSLewis acknowledged that, within just a decade or two after the book was published, the prevailing philosophical schools of thought had shifted so much that many of his references became almost completely obscure to later readers. He added a running series of page headers to explain some of them.

* TrueArtIsIncomprehensible: [[invoked]] Also {{parodied}} with the singing of Glugly, who cannot speak owing to an accident at birth, so just babbles and makes rude noises. She gets rave reviews from all the critics.

** He also observes that having a character named "Mother Kirk" made it seem (wrongly) that he was arguing for [[ChristianityIsCatholic a specific ecclesiastical position]], when in fact he only chose it because he thought "UsefulNotes/{{Christianity}}" was an unconvincing character name.

* GarnishingTheStory: Well, why ''shouldn't'' [[RomanticismVersusEnlightenment Romanticism and Enlightenment]] be allegorized as dragons for our heroes to slay?

* EnemyMine: Mr. Neo-Angular, Mr. Neo-Classical, and Mr. Humanist representing Catholicism, Classicism, and Humanism respectively despite being siblings, hate each other but are trying to form a community together as they all hate; the giant "Spirit of the Age", the city of Eschropolis, and Mr Halfways.

* CoitusEnsues: John's first encounter with the first brown girl ends quickly in sex.

* {{Bulverism}}: Master Parrot, one of the Spirit of the Age's prisoners, gives a "catechism" saying that argument is only the person trying to justify their desires, and delivers a few answers that amount to "you say that because you are an X." The jailer praises him and promises him a reward.

* CowboyBebopAtHisComputer: An early mass market paperback edition helpfully included some explanatory endnotes, or at least tried to--of the thirty endnotes, nineteen simply read "Source unknown." These "unknown" sources include some pretty familiar quotations such as "The fool has said in his heart, there is no God," a well-known line from the Literature/BookOfPsalms. The worst offender though is probably the "explanation" for the phrase "''Peccatum Adae''"[[note]]Latin for "The sin of Adam"[[/note]]: "Source unknown. Creator/LordByron refers to an Ada."

* OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions: Mr. Enlightenment and his son naturally take this view.

* BodyHorror: The "Spirit of the Age" has the ability to make a person's skin transparent to reveal the insides of the body and it is not a pretty picture, especially the man with cancer.

* AdamAndEvePlot: Basically Mother Kirk's story is a retelling of Genesis chapter 1 to 3.

* CoitusEnsues: John's first encounter with the first brown girl.

* InstantAwesomeJustAddDragons: Well, why ''shouldn't'' [[RomanticismVersusEnlightenment Romanticism and Enlightenment]] be allegorized as dragons for our heroes to slay?

* LiteraryAllusionTitle: To John Bunyan's ''Literature/ThePilgrimsProgress'', of course. Lewis makes it a PerspectiveFlip as the title character has to find his way back to a belief in reason and God, unlike Bunyan's story which begins with the conversion.

* TheWarOnStraw: In an introduction to a later edition of the book, Lewis admits that his younger self wasn't entirely fair to all the ideologies he was criticizing at the time.

* ThatRemindsMeOfASong: Throughout the book, characters take opportunities to recite poetry.

* SurvivalThroughSelfSacrifice: John meets Death in a mountain pass on a stormy night. John realizes that the fear of Death has motivated his entire journey, while Death hammers home that dying is inevitable, and John only has two choices: accept it, or fight against it futilely.
-->"What am I to do?" said John.
-->"Which you choose," said the Voice. "Jump, or be thrown. Shut your eyes, or have them bandaged by force. Give in or struggle."
-->"I would sooner do the first, if I could."
-->"Then I am your servant and no more your master. The cure of death is dying. He who lays down his liberty in that act receives it back."

* [[GratuitousEnglish Gratuitous Languages]]: Mr Sensible likes throwing in different languages like French when he speaks for some reason.

* AuthorTract: Ya ''think?!''

** He also observes that having a character named "Mother Kirk" made it seem (wrongly) that he was arguing for a specific ecclesiastical position, when in fact he only chose it because he thought "UsefulNotes/{{Christianity}}" was an unconvincing character name.