In C.S. Lewis’s Space Trilogy, the fictional planet where Ransom first arrives is called Malacandra.
Malacandra is the name used by its inhabitants for Mars in Out of the Silent Planet, the trilogy’s first novel. The book was published in 1938 and follows Elwin Ransom, a Cambridge philologist who is abducted and taken into space. Lewis uses the planet to explore language, morality, colonialism, and humanity’s place in the universe.
The novel’s setting reflects older astronomical names while giving Mars a distinctive fictional society. Ransom encounters several intelligent species, collectively described through the planet’s languages and cultures. The inhabitants’ social order contrasts sharply with the human violence and exploitation represented by the expedition that brings him there.
The trilogy’s other planetary names are easy to confuse. Perelandra is Venus, the setting of the second book, while Thulcandra is Earth. Malacandra therefore identifies Mars and the first destination in Ransom’s interplanetary journey.