Katalepsis

With the gift of a new Kindle for Christmas, I have been reading a bunch of fiction for enjoyment — much in the same way I might watch throwaway television shows for the same purpose. I never read the Narnia books as a child. I do remember reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, but I had little knowledge of the rest of the series until high school. And by then, there seemed little point in reading a children’s series.

Having read them now, I can’t say that my opinion has changed all that much. The books are extremely quick reads (~2,000 “locations” under the new Kindle formatting) and are suitable for a very young audience. They all exist in the fictional world of Narnia and feature the adventures of children (from our world) who get drawn into it. Here, I’d like to offer some basic impressions and thoughts.

Spoiler alert: the following contains plot details.

Much has been made over the reading order of the novels, since their internal chronology differs from the order in which they were written. However, since the narrative voice appears to follow the publishing order, I would recommend not deviating from what appear to be Lewis’s original intentions. That sets up the following order:

1. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
2. Prince Caspian
3. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
4. The Silver Chair
5. The Horse and His Boy
6. The Magician’s Nephew
7. The Last Battle

The arguments stem from the fact that The Magician’s Nephew is a prequel to the rest of the series and details the creation of Narnia, and The Horse and His Boy chronicles events that took place sometime during the original rule of the four children over Narnia — a reign that is glossed over at the end of Wardrobe before the children’s return to England.

Looking back over the series, I’d have to say that the first two remain my favorite. These books introduce you to the world of Narnia and detail the original adventures of the Pevensies (the four children). The books that follow pick up different protagonists to whom I never grew very attached. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader does feature the younger Pevensies (Edmund and Lucy), but their character development is lost to the format of the novel: essentially a classic “road trip” novel featuring the adventures they run into along the way. This puts it in a line of great “road trip” tales — from Homer’s Odyssey to Twain’s Huckleberry Finn. But, of course, it cannot hold a candle to either.

The Silver Chair features Eustace (a protagonist picked up in the Dawn Treader) and a new one, Jill Pole, as they journey to the Northern reaches of Narnia in search of Caspian’s nephew. The Pevensie children are gone by this point. The novel drags in several places and never quite establishes its pacing and purpose.

The Horse and His Boy, as mentioned, leaps back in time to the reign of the Pevensies, yet the novel hardly features them at all. Instead, we get a new protagonist, Shasta, who escapes from Southern Calormen to Archenland, running into adventures along the way.

The Magician’s Newphew is somewhat interesting, in that it details the creation of Narnia and tells the story of the White Witch, the first “fall” of mankind, and the introduction of evil into the world. By now, the Christian allegory of the novels is getting rather heavy-handed, whatever Lewis’s claims may be.

Finally, The Last Battle features the coming of the anti-Christ and the destruction of Narnia. Unfortunately, Lewis seems to lose some of his best storytelling elements here. The description of “heaven” in the final few chapters is incredible — thinking of such joys, it is not hard to see how the promise of heaven will always remain a powerful incentive to believe in Christianity. Lewis is brave enough to feature the death of all his main protagonists (with the strange omission of Susan, who has apparently grown to “feminine” and adult-like for Narnia). Instead of ending on a bittersweet note, however, they are whisked all off to heaven and everyone lives happily ever. Except, of course, Susan. I’d love to read a story about Susan’s life after this point. She loses all of her siblings in a single train accident and they all live happily ever after without her.

My complaints about the series are really directed at children’s novels in general. There is not enough dark material here. The mythical background of Narnia is inconsistent and lacking in depth. When you read Lord of the Rings, you come away in awe of the amount of backstory that went into Middle Earth. You feel as if it is a real place with a history all of its own. In Narnia, Lewis often talks of other times and places, but does so in passing. You feel as if he’s given it about as much thought as you have.

Moreover, every problem gets resolved in the most fortunate manner, often within a paragraph or two of its introduction. The series is strongest when the White Witch is present, because she provides a serious counterpoint to the fortune of the children. In the novels where she is absent, the story suffers because of the need for a quality villain.

Ultimately, I cannot recommend the novels very highly. I think they are nice children’s novels, but offer little for the adult reader.