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So I have to get this off of my chest.
Does it bother anyone else that the world has become convinced that The Chronicles of Narnia should be presented in Chronological Order?
I mean, since 1994, every copy in print goes in this order:
1. The Magician's Nephew
2. The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe
3. The Horse and His Boy
4. Prince Caspian
5. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
6. The Silver Chair
7. The Last Battle
This is so very, VERY wrong.
The correct order, you see, is the order in which they were written and published:
1. L, W, W.
2. Caspian
3. Dawn Treader
4. Siver Chair
5. Horse & Boy
6. Magician's Nephew
7. Last Battle
What happened was that C. S. Lewis died. And someone somewhere unearthed a letter in which he was corresponding with a little boy, and the little boy said "I like to read these books in Narnian Chronological order" and C.S. Lewis said "yeah, I like that way too in fact maybe even BETTER than the original way". And so the publishers went "Oh that's the author's PREFERRED publication order!" and changed it.
Here's the problem - Lewis was talking to a little boy who had ALREADY READ THE SERIES. He already knew all the characters, so reading them out of order wasn't such a problem. However, it WRECKS THE STORY to do so on a first read.
LWW introduces us to Aslan, the White Witch, and the land of Narnia. The lamp-post, the wardrobe, and all the creatures. It's written from a point of view which encourages the reader to be amazed. It's written as though the reader has no idea who these characters are - and they don't!
The Magician's Nephew, on the other hand, although it tells how Narnia was created, is written as though the reader already knows who Aslan is, who the White Witch is, and already knows about the lamp post and the wardrobe. It's more of a "ohh, so THAT'S how that got to be that way" book.
If you read Magician's Nephew first, it wrecks LWW. You don't WONDER about anything. It doesn't make you think.
And really that's one of my pet peeves - anything that encourages us NOT to think is a BAD thing.
So then we have the movie - which THANK GOD is the correct first movie to do. But then you have dozens of online review sites going "well they DID choose to do the movies out-of-order, and that's confusing, but it's ok because it's a good story". ARGH!
So back to my thread title...
I have, in my possession, an OLD Scholastic version of the Chronicles of Narnia. It's ugly, it came in a little box and was purchased through one of those "buy books through your school and your school makes money" programs when I was in 3rd grade. That makes it nearly 25 years old now. It's falling apart.
But I can't go buy a nice new leather-bound version, because they're ALL IN THE WRONG ORDER.
Here I am, trying to build a library of literary classics for my children...
Does it bother anyone else that the world has become convinced that The Chronicles of Narnia should be presented in Chronological Order?
I mean, since 1994, every copy in print goes in this order:
1. The Magician's Nephew
2. The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe
3. The Horse and His Boy
4. Prince Caspian
5. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
6. The Silver Chair
7. The Last Battle
This is so very, VERY wrong.
The correct order, you see, is the order in which they were written and published:
1. L, W, W.
2. Caspian
3. Dawn Treader
4. Siver Chair
5. Horse & Boy
6. Magician's Nephew
7. Last Battle
What happened was that C. S. Lewis died. And someone somewhere unearthed a letter in which he was corresponding with a little boy, and the little boy said "I like to read these books in Narnian Chronological order" and C.S. Lewis said "yeah, I like that way too in fact maybe even BETTER than the original way". And so the publishers went "Oh that's the author's PREFERRED publication order!" and changed it.
Here's the problem - Lewis was talking to a little boy who had ALREADY READ THE SERIES. He already knew all the characters, so reading them out of order wasn't such a problem. However, it WRECKS THE STORY to do so on a first read.
LWW introduces us to Aslan, the White Witch, and the land of Narnia. The lamp-post, the wardrobe, and all the creatures. It's written from a point of view which encourages the reader to be amazed. It's written as though the reader has no idea who these characters are - and they don't!
The Magician's Nephew, on the other hand, although it tells how Narnia was created, is written as though the reader already knows who Aslan is, who the White Witch is, and already knows about the lamp post and the wardrobe. It's more of a "ohh, so THAT'S how that got to be that way" book.
If you read Magician's Nephew first, it wrecks LWW. You don't WONDER about anything. It doesn't make you think.
And really that's one of my pet peeves - anything that encourages us NOT to think is a BAD thing.
So then we have the movie - which THANK GOD is the correct first movie to do. But then you have dozens of online review sites going "well they DID choose to do the movies out-of-order, and that's confusing, but it's ok because it's a good story". ARGH!
So back to my thread title...
I have, in my possession, an OLD Scholastic version of the Chronicles of Narnia. It's ugly, it came in a little box and was purchased through one of those "buy books through your school and your school makes money" programs when I was in 3rd grade. That makes it nearly 25 years old now. It's falling apart.
But I can't go buy a nice new leather-bound version, because they're ALL IN THE WRONG ORDER.
Here I am, trying to build a library of literary classics for my children...
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