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[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

I suppose my main beef with Narnia was just that it was so....twee.

Twee

1. Originally: ‘sweet’, dainty, chic. Now only in depreciatory use: affectedly dainty or quaint; over-nice, over-refined, precious, mawkish. (OED)

Always wondered about that...

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Fordim Hedgethistle

Twee

1. Originally: ‘sweet’, dainty, chic. Now only in depreciatory use: affectedly dainty or quaint; over-nice, over-refined, precious, mawkish. (OED)

Always wondered about that...

That's it. I find Narnia just a bit too quaint...

Not perilous enough for my tastes...It's OK, but compared to Middle-earth or multiple parallel universes you can cut into or rambling Gothic castles it's nowhere near as exciting. Even if it does have Turkish Delight (drooooooooool....).

[Azaelia of Willowbottom]

Originally Posted by Fordim

The claim that Susan was denied Narnia because of cosmetics and sex was endurable when made by the Madonna of Modern Fantasy but I simply cannot let a fellow Downer go unchallenged on this point. Susan is not condemned for anything so trivial: she is condemned instead for "forgetting" Narnia and pretending that it was all a game. She lost her faith and her belief. In The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe Edmund's first (and, to my mind, worst) act of betrayal was his cruel denial that he and Lucy had been to another world, and his lie that he and she had only been pretending. He is redeemed of this lie but only after going through some terrible things. For Susan to turn around in her supposed maturity and thoughtlessly do the same thing is the height of arrogant pride and foolishness. She is not "kicked out" of Narnia any more than Satan was "kicked out" of Heaven--they are both rebels who turn away from their true home. (Very Important Note--I am not saying that Susan is Satan, nor am I suggesting that she is in any way shape or manner Satanic: I am merely making an analogy for the sake of illustrating my argument.)

Hmm. Interesting.
I always thought that Susan forgot Narnia and began to believe it to be just a game (in other words, she lost it) BECAUSE she became interested in boys and lipstick. She wasn't, I agree, thrown out of Narnia...but I think she lost it or it let her go as her interests shifted, so she saw her memories of it as just a game. Perhaps this is because I just can't grasp the idea of having something so vivid as finding another (real) world through a wardrobe be dismissed years later as a game...at least, not without some kind of reason for it.

Perhaps I am guilty of over-thinking the incident. It does happen.

I think that the manner in which it was presented is an issue, then, if what she was really being punished for was her denial of Narnia. It could have functioned just fine on its own--Susan is all grown up and she looks back and laughs at their childish games, and can't believe that her siblings are still playing. Why, then, is the mention of boys and makeup necessary at all? It's as though Lewis is condemning those things, things that most girls can't help but be interested in (though I'll admit I never had much patience for makeup, myself). And even then, the issue is still there--Susan loses Narnia in the process of growing up...therefore, growing up is a bad thing...still not a particularly desirable message.

I see redemption/forgiveness/absolution as major themes of Christianity...I don't like the idea of a condemning God. I think a more powerful message would have been Susan being welcomed back in spite of those things. That would read more as the power of forgiveness and redemption as opposed to whoops, you lost your faith, too bad for you. That's probably moving into personal belief territory, where I'd rather not go, though.

I do agree with Lal--whatever messages Narnia sends, I think that perhaps a better series for young girls would be HDM, or even Harry Potter...and also that when I re-read it, it did seem to generally be missing something. Other books are more exciting, including HDM.

[Morthoron]

Personally, I prefer Lewis's Screwtape Letters to Narnia. Having read LWW once, I see no reason to ever read it again, as the plot is cloying and the hodgepodge of mythological references is contrived.

[Lalwendë]

If you compare Susan's treatment with Lyra's growing up, the latter has a much more positive view. Some say what happens to Lyra is negative and that Pullman is giving out the message that fantasy and fantasising are childish things (this may indeed have been davem - if not he can punish me with the washing up later...:P). But no. Without giving too much away, Lyra is told that she must stop telling lies (hence the name?) and instead tell the tales which she finds through living her life - a lesson that life is for living, that at the end of it you should have stories to tell. She is not stopped from adventuring (as shown in Lyra's Oxford and the promise of the Book of Dust), not stopped from operating in a fantastic world, but she is also not prevented from growing up. That's a fantastic message, especially for someone like me who is a grown up who loves magic and mystery. Much better than Peter Pan or Narnia where only the infantile are allowed access to magic.

Likewise with what JK Rowling does with her young female characters. They are allowed to have boyfriends and learn about being grown up while still operating in a magical world, and what's more she makes it cool to be clever.

[Morwen]

I loved the Chronicles of Narnia as a child and re read each book into a state of dog earred dinginess. I loved Lewis' talking animals and his magical world that you could get to through wardrobes and paintings. Narnia isn't really magical for me any more and I wouldn't recommend the books to an adult but I think the Chronicles are great books for children and since that was Lewis' target audience I would recommend them as such and have in fact done so.

Originally posted by Fordim
The claim that Susan was denied Narnia because of cosmetics and sex was endurable when made by the Madonna of Modern Fantasy but I simply cannot let a fellow Downer go unchallenged on this point. Susan is not condemned for anything so trivial: she is condemned instead for "forgetting" Narnia and pretending that it was all a game. She lost her faith and her belief. In The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe Edmund's first (and, to my mind, worst) act of betrayal was his cruel denial that he and Lucy had been to another world, and his lie that he and she had only been pretending. He is redeemed of this lie but only after going through some terrible things. For Susan to turn around in her supposed maturity and thoughtlessly do the same thing is the height of arrogant pride and foolishness. She is not "kicked out" of Narnia any more than Satan was "kicked out" of Heaven--they are both rebels who turn away from their true home. (Very Important Note--I am not saying that Susan is Satan, nor am I suggesting that she is in any way shape or manner Satanic: I am merely making an analogy for the sake of illustrating my argument.)

I agree. The "lipstick and nylon" criticism of Susan made by either Polly or Jill, IIRC is because the entire focus of Susan's life at that point was her appearance and invitations to parties. She isn't merely being criticised for having other interests. She no longer has time for anything else including talk of Narnia, dismissing all talk of it as a silly game that she and her siblings had played as children.
Of course the reason all the others are in "Narnia within Narnia" is are because they were all together when a particular event took place. If Susan had been with them where would she have ended up? Would she also have entered Narnia w/in Narnia but be in the position of the denying Dwarves?

[Thenamir]

I have just completed reading a most excellent biography of Lewis entitled The Narnian by Alan Jacobs. Within a section in which Jacobs attempts to address Lewis's perceived misogyny, he addresses this exact point (any typos are my own transcription errors):

Most troubling to many readers is what the American writer Neil Gaiman has called "the problem of Susan"...The problem is that, as we are told in The Last Battle, Susan is "no longer a friend of Narnia" -- she does not appear with her brothers and sisters when they return to Narnia, that is, the Real Narnia, Narnia remade. According to Jill, "She's interested in nothing nowadays except nylons and lipstick and invitations." For the gifted children's writer and fantasy novelist Philip Pullman, the meaning of this is all too plain: Susan has undergone puberty, and her sexual maturation is "so dreadful and so redolent of sin that [Lewis] had to send her to Hell." But this is nonsense on several counts. First, it is clearly not sexuality that is Susan's problem but rather an excessive regard for social acceptance: she wants to be "grown-up" because she is at an age when being grown-up is the greatest possible good and being childish the worst possible crime. Susan has been distracted from Narnia not by sexual desire but by the desire to be within the Inner Ring. (As Lewis had written years earlier, some young people pursue their first sexual experience less because they want sex itself, -- that prospect can be as frightening as it is desireable -- than because they want the social acceptance that sexual experience can bring.)

More important, Susan cannot have been "sent to Hell" because she has not died -- something Pullman could have easily discovered if he had been concerned with the truth of his accusation against Lewis. in 1957 a boy had writen to Lewis with some conren for the fate of Susan, and here is the reply her received: "The books don't tell us what happened to Susan. She is left alive in this world at the end, having turned into a rahter sill, conceited young woman. But there is plenty of time for her to mend, and perhaps she will get to Aslan's country in the end -- in her own way."
~~ pp. 259-260

I can add nothing to that. Jacobs has written quite an interesting bio of Lewis, and I recommend it highly.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

For my money, His Dark Materials starts in a very promising manner, but by Vol 3 devolves into a trainwreck: Act III of Faust as retold by William Burroughs. All I got out of it was Pullman's rather snarky attitude than anyone who believes in anything is a deluded fool.

Still, he's a much better author than Michael Moorcock, who once called The Lord of the Rings "epic Pooh." (MM seems to think that the way to give a character depth is to make him act like a sullen teenager. That's doesn't make him deep: it just makes him low.)


Oh, recommendations: not classic "fantasy," but Watership Down is one of the greats. Ursula LeGuin is superb, although most of her work is SF. For a much better cynical take on deities than Pullman's read Gaiman's American Gods. If you like your fantasy decidedly wierd, in a brilliant sort of way, Gene Wolfe is your man. And if you want to laff till your sides split, try any of Terry Pratchett's Discworld books.

Avoid: Brooks, Eddings, Jordan. Stephen Donaldson has some interesting ideas but executes them terribly. George R R Martin is OK but overrated, and starting to fall victim to Jordanism.

Generally avoid: anything whose hardcover jacket involves typical fantasy "art."