You might not want to give away the ending like that, especially when we’re shilling the books to people that might want to go find and read them. 
Heh. I’m probably the same way (I enjoyed Narnia, but I didn’t re-read them until years later, probably high school). Tolkien’s world was so much richer (and writing more betterer 
and sophisticated) that it was kind of a no-brainer. Not until I read the Earthsea books did I fall for a story like I did for Tolkien.
Maybe it depends on your sense of humor - I disagree with Lewis’s viewpoint, but found that scene funny. I laughed my ass off when I read the definition of “Busheney” in “A Series of Unfortunate Events.”
Ah Earthsea: another “children’s book” series that was awesome. Again, fantasy, but deep. The third book, is a truly powerful meditation on life and death. That said, what the hell happened to that series? I read the fourth book, and it was okay, but the ending was confusing as hell and I haven’t read the fifth yet.
I have the fifth (er… it’s around here somewhere, but I can’t remember the name). It’s a bunch of short stories, some of which were good and others just meh. I think the first three were great, but the focus shifted and lost some of its strength with the fourth, IMO.
There’s now a sixth apparently as well, now that I check. Geez, I have a lot of reading to catch up on.
Wizard of Earthsea is one of my favourite books, of any genre, any age group. The fourth book, Tenar, is probably the worst book I have ever read. The word ‘trainwreck’ is overused, but that’s what it was, in slow motion.
Ursula! What…are…you…doing…Nooooooooooooooooo!!!
On its own it was just a bad, misshapen, boring book. Taken as part of the wizard of earthsea though it was so much worse, as if Le Guin was almost glorifying in her ineptitude.
[Tyler Durden on]
I wanted to destroy something beautiful
[Tyler Durden off]
Anyhoo, I’m in complete agreement with the OP, the Narnia books are v. poor. Badly written books are not good, ever. They’re enduringly popular though, so this is definitely a minority viewpoint. It seems they occupy similar ground to Lord of the Rings, having been written at an early stage in the genre they’ve managed to cement themselves as popular classics.
No, I don’t see how you get there from the quote. The author paints a rather good picture of a rather bad school; not bad merely because it is co-ed, not bad merely because it is “progressive” (though I dare say this doesn’t endear it to Lewis), but bad because it is run by an incompetent trendy and his or her (her, IIRC) lackeys who like to spout on about psychology when in all probability they don’t know enough about it to fill a matchbox. At any rate, when I had read this paragraph I did not know all I needed to know about “progressive” education, but I knew all I needed to know about the school itself and what Jill Pole had to be unhappy about.
Several years ago my bookclub did three kids fantasy books. Lion Witch and the Wardrobe, Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone, and the first of the Taran books.
We’d done this because we were griping about the quality of Harry Potter in a “kid’s these days wouldn’t know good writing if it bit them in the butt.” (Helps that one of my girlfriend’s husband is SF/Fantasy writer, and there are some sour grapes over the whole success of the HP series).
Harry Potter was universally agreed to be the best. Most readable and engaging, though not the best thought out (really inconsistant world - if world is a major feature for you in Fantasy).
The Alexander wasn’t as readable, but had a much better world and we agreed it had more “seriousness.” Tolkien light.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe disappointed us all. We’d all remembered it fondly as a great book and as adults found it to be really a clumsy book. Poorly written, not terribly charming. As an adult, it seemed terribly preachy.
I am aghast that others don’t find Lewis’s prose style charming. I think it’s really fun, and I love the kind of asides that make it seem like it’s really a story told by your (occasionally curmudgeonly) grandfather and not words on a page.
And reading the books as an adult – as hostile as I am to religion, anything that can get me to empathize with the faithful (as I did, for instance, in the scene of Susand and Lucy playing with Aslan before his sacrifice); well, no one’s going to do that who doesn’t have the chops.
–Cliffy
Nitpick: Aren’t Susan and Lucy playing with Aslan after his resurrection - when he’s brim-full of new life? There is an equally touching scene before, when they are comforting him in a kind of Garden of Gesthemane setting (and without knowing exactly what the matter is, only that Aslan is desperately sad).
But the grandfather touch: exactly. The Hobbit is like that in many places too.
That kind of writing style is definitely out of fashion nowadays. I can certainly see how some people could find it charming while others find it grating.
I think it’s fair to say that the Narnia books are overrated, or at least overhyped lately what with the movie coming out. But nothing that so many people have so much lasting affection for can be utter crap. The last time I read them, I found them to be easy, ejoyable reads, with moments of real power in them; but they are by no means either my favorite works of fantasy or my favorite works by Lewis. (And I do agree that the Chronicles of Prydain are very good, underrated, and deserve to be more widely known.)
The criticisms put forth here by the OP and others, I would call a combination of (1) real, but not fatal, flaws, (2) differences of taste, and (3) criticizing Lewis for not doing what he wasn’t even trying to do anyway.
The Chronicles of Prydain are what I always point to as an example of fantasy fiction for the younger set which are better than the Harry Potter books ( which I read and think are okay, but far more overhyped than Narnia ). Classic stuff.
- Tamerlane
Maybe I’m getting the two scenes mixed up; it’s almost two years since I last read it. Mostly what I remember was my sense of finally understanding what the faithful get out of their faith. I never really got that before. I still reject religion, of course, but I think I understand its charms better now than I had.
–Cliffy
I agree with several of the OPs points. I am rereading the series to my girlfriend who never read it growing up and am struck by them being significantly less well written than I remember. I particularly did not like Voyage of the Dawn Treader as it strung together several random and almost completely unlreated events, all ending in Aslan ex Machinas. However, it had one of the best first sentences I have ever read:
While I believe that everyone is entitled to their own opinion on these books, I must say that it’s comforting to discover in this thread that there are other folks like me who are definitely not wild about them. I read all of Magician’s Nephew, started the Lion book & couldn’t finish it, never picked up the others. (This from someone who has read and loved LOTR over and over since 1965. )
I enjoy the Harry Potter books, but I agree with you about the hype and which series is better. The Potter series tends to tell you where to go; Prydain lets you figure it out for yourself.
Persons reading this thread may find the New Yorker’s review of the new Narnia movie of interest. Here’s a quote:
"…Lewis lovers must squabble among themselves. I cannot join the party, having missed out on Narnia as a child. I was busy elsewhere, up to my armpits in hobbits, and starting to ask hard questions about the sexual longevity of elves. When, as a grownup, I finally opened “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe,” it struck me as woefully thin soil, with none of the gnarled roots of lore and language on which Tolkien thrived. If the movie has to forgo Lewis’s narrative tone, with its grimly Oxonian blend of the bluff and the twee (“And now we come to one of the nastiest things in this story”), that is fine by me. And, if there is Deep Magic, as Lewis called it, in his tale, it resides not in the springlike coming of Aslan but in the dreamlike, compacted poetry of Lewis’s initial inspiration—the sight of a faun, in the snow, bearing parcels and an umbrella. That is kept mercifully intact in Adamson’s movie, its potency enriched by the shy, unstrenuous rapport of his two best performers: Georgie Henley, as Lucy, and James McAvoy, as Mr. Tumnus the faun. The dark joke is that Mr. Tumnus invites Lucy to tea only because he must turn his guest over to the enemy. Thus does Lucy, over toast and honey, learn the lesson known to the heroine of every horror flick: Don’t answer the faun. "
I certainly have no problem with people saying they don’t like the books. Tastes differ. But I don’t understand the idea that some people have (and I’m looking right at the OP here), that if they don’t like something, then it must be utter crap, badly overrated or whatever.
Personally, I love the Narnia books and have read them many times since my first reading over 35 years ago. I think they are charmingly written books and I enjoy them every time I read them. I could attempt to refute each of the OP’s points, but why? I won’t convince him and he won’t convince me – I liked the books and he didn’t. And the world spins on.
I dislike Tolkien’s books. They just never did it for me. I slogged through the whole vast pile (The Hobbit, all three Lord of the Ring** books, and The Silmarillion) when I was 19 and thought they were just a monumental snooze-fest. I’ve tried to reread them a few times since, and they still just don’t do it for me. But I’m not coming in here to say they are crap, or overrated, or that people who like them are deluded… I don’t like them, that’s all I’m saying. If what I like is the standard for what is good in the world, then nobody would eat onions, or watch football, or play video games, or listen to hip-hop. Tastes differ.
I love the Earthsea trilogy, BTW (notice I said trilogy – the later books I wasn’t so fond of). Also the Prydain books. In fact, I haven’t reread those in a few years – I think I’ll do so once I finish the books I’m reading now.