Book Review: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

[osprey_archer]

I first read C. S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in fourth grade, then read it again in high school when I was reading all the Narnia books, and to the best of my recollection didn’t reread it the way that I read bits of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Silver Chair over and over.

And yet upon rereading it with littlerhymes, I find that so many parts of the book are engraved on my memory.. Lucy’s journey through the wardrobe; her meeting with Mr. Tumnus. (The incredible tea that he gives her!) Edmund meeting the White Witch and eating the Turkish Delight, and then (horrible child!) pretending that he didn’t go into Narnia at all, but only pretended with Lucy. Mrs. Beaver’s sewing machine, and dinner with the Beavers (really desperately want to try that marmalade roll), and Father Christmas’s appearance, and the courtyard full of statues (more shades of Piranesi!), and the mice gnawing on the ropes that bound Aslan…

Although clearly the 2005 movie has to some extent infected my book memory: I was surprised to realize that the battle in the book is so short, dispatched in just a few pages. Of course this makes perfect sense: the real climax of the book is Aslan’s resurrection and the rescue of the creatures that the White Witch turned to stone, and the battle is a mere mopping up operation after.

I would love to be able to report to you if my fourth-grade self clocked Aslan as a Jesus-figure. Probably not. I strongly suspect that I had already been informed of this fact by the time I read all of Narnia in high school, because I don’t remember any a-ha! moment, and I certainly knew by The Last Battle that the series was an allegory, because I chalked the failure of that book up to that fact.

But I think The Last Battle fails because it’s nothing but an allegory. The rest of the Narnia books (even The Magician’s Nephew, which at the time I also deprecated) are allegories but also good stories with riotous, lush, overflowing, everything-and-the-kitchen-sink worldbuilding. (I love it. I can also absolutely see why J. R. R. Tolkien hated it.) Aslan is a Christ figure but his resurrection also simply works as story. I’m not sure why it works because it ought to feel like a cheat, oughtn’t it? To have the hero come back to life because of a secret never-before-mentioned Even Deeper Magic? But it didn’t when I was a child, and it doesn’t now.

Also, I love how Lewis keeps firmly informing his readers that it’s very silly to close a wardrobe door behind you. Clearly he knew that after reading this book, children around the globe would be crawling into wardrobes and cupboards and closets and anywhere else that might lead to Narnia!

Comments

[asakiyume]

Your last paragraph! I never understood before right now, and I love it. I'm laughing. BECAUSE IT'S TRUE. (I feel like the little squirrel who loses his head and starts shouting "it's true!" Was that what he shouted? or something else before the White Witch bit her lip and turned the animals to stone in that scene?)

Yes, C.S. Lewis really did have a vivid imagination and a great knack for storytelling!

[osprey_archer]

Yes, the little squirrel shouts "It's true! It's true!" when the White Witch insists that Father Christmas couldn't possibly have come. Poor little squirrel... I hope Aslan finds that little stone grouping and brings them back to life again.

I never had the good fortune to encounter an actual wardrobe when I was wardrobe-entering age, and closets never held forth the suggestion of magic. But when I encounter mysterious doors I do always check them, just in case.

[rachelmanija]

Oh I'm sure Aslan does. He's Aslan, after all.

You're so right about why Lewis was so careful to make sure no kids locked themselves in wardrobes. That's so endearing.

[rachelmanija]

I really love this book. It's so timelessly magical and iconic. Everything just works, down to the resurrection. I think part of it is because the language is so beautiful and solemn, and partly because the suffering before - the humiliation and the pain and the long night the girls spend and the caring they and the mice express - makes it feel earned.

[black_bentley]

I re-read this book for the first time in well over a decade about two years ago, and I adored it as much then as I did as a kid. It never loses the magic, and I just love it so much. Aslan's resurrection still gets to me. Every. Single. Time.

[sovay]

I’m not sure why it works because it ought to feel like a cheat, oughtn’t it?

As I may have mentioned before, it worked for me because at the time when I first read the books, I knew more about year-kings and solstitices than I did about Christianity and so it didn't matter if I didn't recognize the sacrifice and resurrection of Aslan as paralleling those of Christ, I understood perfectly that the sun was slaughtered at midwinter and came back with a lion's mane of rays and then the world began to warm again; Lewis had built in a perfectly decent pagan backdoor.

[lucymonster]

I’m a little ashamed to say that my fondness for the Disney movies, flawed as they are, has spoiled some of my enjoyment of LWW and (especially) Caspian. I keep wanting to project the exciting live action scenes in my head onto the perfectly charming little book passages that inspired them, and feeling let down when the conflict resolves so much more easily than it did on screen. I know the books are Objectively better value but I can’t help it.

That said, I also loved Lewis’ repeated warnings against climbing into wardrobes! He knew his audience well, that one.

I think as a kid a lot of the allegory went over my head, which is probably why The Last Battle made so little sense - as you say, without the Biblical parallels, there’s really nothing there. But the resurrection works much better, partly I think because Lewis put so much work into establishing Aslan as magnificent and untouchable and having access to deep Truths beyond all the other characters, so the Deeper Magic ended up feeling (to me at least) more like a long-due explanation of all that greatness than like a mere day-saving asspull.

[osprey_archer]

It's just such an incredibly well-constructed book. Perfect pacing! So many iconic scenes! Aslan's death is so sad, and his resurrection always seems like such a breath-taking wonderful unexpected thing even when you know it's coming.

[osprey_archer]

I must confess I was a tiny bit letdown by the itty bitty scrap of a battle that we get, having gone into it with vague memories of the film extravaganza. Ah well! We can't have everything!

Lewis is one of those writers who is simply phenomenal at remembering what it's like to be a child. Not every writer can do it! And I sometimes think that non-parents have an advantage at remembering it from the inside, as it were.

And it's true, Aslan really does feel like the kind of character who needs and deserves an extra super-cool magical explanation! It fits perfectly with everything that we've seen of him.

[osprey_archer]

I've read that Lewis also loved all the variations of the resurrected hero in the stories of the world, and I think some of that layered love comes through here: yes it's a Christ story, but it's not just a Christ story, it's every hero who ever went to the underworld and returned.

[osprey_archer]

Probably before he slipped out of Narnia, Aslan went on a quick whirlwind tour just to find all the statues in need of rescue. Don't want to leave any loose ends dangling!

[osprey_archer]

Yes, this book is just so perfectly constructed, the plotting and the pacing and the sudden arrival of Father Christmas and everything. I can see why the slapdash worldbuilding drove Tolkien, specifically, around the bend, but it simply works perfectly for the kind of story that it is.

And yes! It feels so right that it's the love of the girls and the mice that helps to bring Aslan back. Could he have come back without it, I mean maybe (probably!), but it wouldn't be as joyful.

[sovay]

I've read that Lewis also loved all the variations of the resurrected hero in the stories of the world

That makes sense to me. He threaded a lot of mythologies into Narnia.

[genarti]

The end of Dawn Treader was when I clocked that Aslan was Jesus -- the lamb turned into a lion, and I went "ohhhhhhh." Child me always thought that was a bit of a cheat, though. It's not that I felt betrayed by the discovery of baked-in Christianity or allegory, exactly, but I felt that a self-contained numinous god-lion was far more interesting.

I do think there are parts of The Last Battle that stand alone, and they were my favorite parts -- Tirian and Jewel and Eustace and Jill, basically, and Jill and Eustace's return to Narnia with their feet under them at last, and grappling with how to save something beloved and dear and huge like a country and its people when you can't but you can't not try. Those were the bits I read and reread over again, and still have lines from memorized. But I'd always skip past the Shift and Puzzle bits -- they made me too mad for poor Puzzle -- and sometimes I'd stop before the end, even if some of the end was beautifully written and has stuck with me too. But its happy ending depends on the allegory being accepted, and you're right that for the rest of the stories, the happy ending works without that.

[littlerhymes]

The theological implications of having Father Christmas in a world where Jesus is a lion are so - so so so so interesting lol.

The iconic scenes remain iconic and they are all so close together! The PACING, I can only applaud.

[asakiyume]

There were no wardrobes in my life either, but I totally *did* take closets as suggesting magic--especially ones with lots of coats in the.

[osprey_archer]

"But how does Father Christmas come into it," I imagine Tolkien sobbing. "How does he EXIST in a world where Jesus is a LION."

"VIBES, Tollers!" Lewis explains patiently, waving the question away with a flick of his pipe.

[osprey_archer]

Apparently Lewis received a lot of letters from anxious young readers who were concerned that they loved Aslan more than Jesus. There is probably something weird theological going on in creating a Jesus-Lion? It's a bit like how different Jesuses in different countries are painted to look like the locals... except when you're localizing Jesus for children, he becomes not a child but a lion.

In a weird way I'm looking forward to The Last Battle! I don't expect to enjoy it more, exactly, but I do think I'll see different things in it this time around.

[sanguinity]

Interesting that Aslan’s resurrection worked for you as a story before you knew it was a Christian allegory. My memory of my first reading is the exact opposite: Aslan’s resurrection made no sense/failed to land in the same way that the crucifixion story made no sense to me/failed to land. When someone told me the whole thing was a Christ allegory, I was all _THAT makes sense now!_

[genarti]

Aww! But yes, that makes total sense to me. Aslan is there and physically present for the kids and Narnians (not all the time, and apparently not for long stretches of Narnia time, but at some point in every book) and also is a giant magic lion. I've seen a lot of fanfic that takes for granted that the Pevensies et al also felt that way, which I suspect was not Lewis's intent for them, but one does understand why...

I'm very interested to hear what you think of The Last Battle! I'm one of the few, I think, for whom it wasn't least favorite, but I always felt very conflicted about it. I still do, but in a more intellectualized way nowadays.

[osprey_archer]

Aslan is giant lion who will let you ride on his back and plunge your hands into his magnificent mane! Will Jesus do any of that??

Do you have a least favorite Narnia book? Very curious to hear what it is if it's not The Last Battle.

I think my response to a lot of children's books is more intellectualized than it used to be. (Narnia perhaps less than many others, actually: Lewis is just so good at sweeping you up in the story!) On the one hand this means I appreciate a wider range of books than I used to, but I don't love them with the same depth, perhaps...

[skygiants]

When I was extremely small I used to reread the tea scene to make myself hungry for dinner. (Did I have any idea what sardines on toast would actually taste like? NOT ONE.)

[silverusagi]

I reread this book many times a child. I just loved the adventure and the magic of it. At some point I realized Jesus was a lion, but it was not right away. I mean, I knew there was something vaguely religious going on because of all the Daughter of Eve, Son of Adam stuff, but I did not clock the rest of it.

[osprey_archer]

C. S. Lewis is so good at writing exciting, fast-paced adventure, with lots of magic. It just really feels like he has so much imagination that it's overflowing the book and pouring out the cracks.

[osprey_archer]

YES that is a perfect use for the tea scene! Amazing food description, 10/10. It's odd that a food description can be so evocative even when you haven't actually eaten the food described and have no idea what it tastes like, but it totally works.

[genarti]

My least favorite Narnia book was always Magician's Nephew! An unpopular choice -- I know a lot of people love it. But while I liked Digory and Polly fine, it didn't feel like a Narnia book to me, you know? I didn't see why Narnia needed any backstory about how it came to be -- you don't need to explain how the Earth came about, regardless of how religious you are on the subject, in order to write a book set here -- or when the first people from Earth went there. It was fun backstory to have Professor Kirke be someone who had been to Narnia too, but I didn't want him to be the first one, or for the first Narnia travelers to have been from Victorian England; I wanted there to have been occasional Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve throughout history, their origins and identities unknown to the Pevensies but known to Aslan. So in another book I might have loved the Wood Between The Worlds with its castaway guinea pigs and so on, but it felt to me like an unrelated Kids Encounter Magical Devices In London sort of book that happened to cross over with Narnia towards the end and establish a bunch of headcanons I preferred to ignore along the way. About the only part I really loved was when Fledge the carthorse came into his own. And I liked Frank and Helen; I always wanted more about them.

I agree about the more intellectualized response to children's books in general! Possibly it's an inevitable part of growing up, but I do sometimes miss the uncritical intense love and immersion.

[osprey_archer]

I wanted there to have been occasional Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve throughout history, their origins and identities unknown to the Pevensies but known to Aslan.

Oh yes, that would have been fun! (And IMO part of the problem with The Last Battle is that it closes down the possibility that You, Dear Reader, might find your way to Narnia yourself.) And in general I shared the feeling that all this backstory isn't really necessary and in fact detracts - do we need to know about the origin of the wardrobe or the lamp post or Jadis or indeed Narnia itself?

Also surely having evil come into the world from outside the world, as Jadis does, causes some sort of theological problem with the worldbuilding.

I did love Fledge the carthorse turning into a pegasus though. And the Wood Between the Worlds is SUCH a vivid image.

The intellectualized response may not be an inevitable part of growing up, but perhaps an inevitable part of becoming a critical/discerning reader who has more elaborate responses to books than "I loved it!/I hated it"? It isn't an ability I would want to lose but there are times it would be nice to just turn it off for a book or two.

[copperfyre]

Coming to this very belatedly, I do love The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. It really is so magical, and I do check every wardrobe I find just in case! All the descriptions of Lucy first finding Narnia, and the ever-lasting winter, and her tea with Tumnus - gosh, I can remember how I felt reading them for the first time even now!

I managed to read the entire Narnia series without ever clocking the Christian allegory part of it, somehow, but the Aslan resurrection bit worked for me anyway even without that context. The Stone Table and the Deep Magic From Before The Dawn Of Time still sends shivers through me, it's so compelling. Somewhere in my parents house there's a book review I wrote when I was about 6 which cites The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe as my favourite book, and it includes me describing that whole sequence.

And I hated The Last Battle because a) Narnia is destroyed! How can you destroy Narnia?!, and b) there's a line at the end that's something like "and then everyone went on to have many magical adventures that cannot be related here" and I was so mad about this. How dare you tempt me with adventures you won't describe, Lewis, what do you think I'm here for?!

[osprey_archer]

Look, you just NEVER KNOW when you'll find the right wardrobe! And just because it's possible to outgrow the Narnia wardrobe doesn't mean that there might not be OTHER magical worlds to find...

Oh gosh I love that you write a book review when you were six retelling the best bits of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. That's so perfect.

There's bit in... now I can't remember which book, actually maybe Dawn Treader? Where Lewis is like "Maybe I'll write a book about the Lone Islands someday!" And then of course he never did! Why dangle the possibility before us like that, sir?