In C.S. Lewis’s first Space Trilogy novel, Malacandra is the fictional name Lewis gives to Mars. The book is Out of the Silent Planet, published in 1938, and its protagonist, Elwin Ransom, is taken from Earth to that world.
Lewis uses the traditional astronomical identity of Mars while giving it an invented social and linguistic structure. Malacandra contains several intelligent species, including the hrossa, séroni, and pfifltriggi. Their societies contrast with the morally damaged human civilization represented by the novel’s antagonists.
The story was partly shaped by Lewis’s interest in planetary romance and by conversations with fellow Oxford writer J.R.R. Tolkien. It also responds critically to some optimistic and imperial assumptions found in earlier science fiction. Lewis’s fictional Mars is not a simple scientific prediction of the real planet’s surface.
The later Space Trilogy novels move the action to other settings. Perelandra takes place on a version of Venus, while That Hideous Strength returns primarily to Earth. Malacandra therefore belongs specifically to Out of the Silent Planet.