Malacandra is the fictional planet where C.S. Lewis's Out of the Silent Planet begins. In the novel, the protagonist Elwin Ransom is abducted from Earth and transported to Malacandra, a world whose inhabitants use that name for Mars.
The book was published in 1938 and is the first volume of Lewis’s Space Trilogy. Its setting combines planetary adventure with philosophical and theological ideas, including questions about language, morality, colonialism, and humanity’s place in the universe. Lewis uses “Thulcandra” for Earth, which the inhabitants describe as the silent planet because it is cut off from wider cosmic communication.
The later books are Perelandra and That Hideous Strength. Readers sometimes mix up Malacandra and Perelandra because both are central planetary settings, but Perelandra is the destination of the second novel, not the first.