Tag Archives: CS Lewis

The Magician’s Book: A Skeptic’s Adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller

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Synopsis:
A literary critic recalls her childhood love affair with CS Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia, and her subsequent disappointment at learning that he was a Christian apologist.

Review:
I confess that I was hesitant to read The Magician’s Book for reasons that Laura Miller herself would understand. Narnia is mine, I tell you, mine! I had a Voyage of the Dawn Treader cake for my sixth birthday–and I still have my coverless copy. I have read and re-read this series more times than I can count. Of course it’s really only jealousy that someone else gets to write about something I love. I’m petty that way.

Unlike Miller, I share CS Lewis’s faith. In fact, I could argue that my faith itself is inextricably linked to Lewis’s writings, particularly The Great Divorce and The Problem of Pain. I’ve attended CS Lewis-themed conferences in Oxford and Cambridge twice in my life, and have read every book of his at least once, and in most cases multiple times. His Space Trilogy is another that I love, and my favorite book of his is Til We Have Faces, his retelling of Cupid and Psyche. So my trepidation was not so much about Narnia, but rather about Lewis himself. I am as loyal as I am stubborn, and can’t bear to see my loved ones criticized by anyone but myself.

Thankfully, Miller is well-suited for the task of discussing Lewis. She goes deep into biography and textual analysis, drawing upon Lewis’s scholarly work and personal passions. I found her discussions of the “romance,” a genre that fascinated both Lewis and JRR Tolkein to be scholarly yet readable. Lewis would’ve been proud, I think. I was intrigued by her ideas on how his personal life influenced the way he thought about reading and writing.

Where Miller truly excels is in quantifying the pleasures of reading. Like Lewis (and like me), Miller is a reader to the bone, and whenever she talks about the joys of reading the Chronicles the book really sings. I love when other readers are able to put into words what happens to bookworms like us when our noses get stuck and our minds get lost. Lewis wrote because he loved to read, and in my opinion, those are the kinds of writers I enjoy most.

I was disappointed that Miller failed to engage with any of Lewis’s apologetics, considering that he is as famous for those as he is for Narnia. She tends to lump all Christians in with some stereotype she has of a close-minded, literal Bible-thumper, confusing at one point Evangelicals with fundamentalists. There is some overlap between the two, but they are not one and the same. The kinds of Christians who embrace Lewis tend to be the kinds who also embrace the ambiguity that Miller thinks is so alien to Christianity. What she fails to grasp is that Christianity, at its core, is a faith built on paradox, one with as much to offer the mind as the heart.

If Miller had bothered to explore the Christianity she rejects, she would have discovered that the wildness she loves in Narnia is central, not antithetical, to Christianity. Instead she chose to look through the lenses of her own preconceptions, and the book is weaker for it. Despite this, I think that The Magician’s Book belongs on the bookshelf of any Lewis aficionado. It’s staying on mine.

Favorite Author Meme

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Heather at Errant Dreams came up with a wonderful meme–enjoy & consider yourself tagged!

* Answer the questions as you see fit. Although they’re all phrased to ask about a singular author, feel free to respond with multiples, or even a list.
* Where possible & convenient (you don’t have to go as crazy as I did!), include a link here or there to an author’s website, your review of one of their books, or a review that inspired you to try the author(s), so your readers can get more information on anyone that sounds interesting.
* Tag five people and drop by their blogs to let them know you tagged them, or open-tag your readers.
* It would be nice if you included a link back to your tagger.

1. Who’s your all-time favorite author, and why?

I think I would have to say CS Lewis. I’ve read all of his books, many of them several times. I’ve read the Narnia Chronicles at least a dozen times, and books like The Great Divorce and The Screwtape Letters have meant a lot to me at certain times in my life.

2. Who was your first favorite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favorites?

The first author I remember being obsessed with–as in, I’ve got to read everything by this person–was John Bellairs. He wrote gothic stories for kids illustrated by Edward Gorey that were imaginative and just scary enough, and the first one I read was The House with a Clock in its Walls. I’m saving a few for Superfast Baby when she’s old enough. I had read multiple books by other authors, but I was more into the series, than the author, as with the All of a Kind Family books.

3. Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favorite authors, and why?

Robin Hobb, without question. She’s a superlative storyteller and I just lost myself in love starting with Assassin’s Apprentice. I’d also add Leo Tolstoy and Jhumpa Lahiri to the list, having read both of them for the first time in 2007.

4. If someone asked you who your favorite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?

Margaret Atwood, Jane Austen, Leo Tolstoy, Stephen King, Madeleine L’Engle, CS Lewis, Robin Hobb, George RR Martin, Shirley Jackson, Patricia Highsmith, Charles Dickens, Kathleen Norris, Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine, Dan Allender, Edith Wharton, Jhumpa Lahiri.

Nothing really to add on further reflection. I spend a lot of time thinking about my favorite authors!

Manola Dargis Doesn’t Do Her Homework

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In her review of Prince Caspian in today’s New York Times, Manola Dargis writes:

The Pevensie children can withdraw to London between episodes, but moviegoers are unlikely, and also perhaps unwilling, to escape from Narnia and the other increasingly numerous, and therefore increasingly mundane, places like it.

A lovely sentiment, were it not for the fact that the Pevensies DIE to our world in one of the books. Not to mention that several of the books don’t feature the Pevensie children at all.

I don’t often pick nits on this blog, but I don’t think it’s appropriate to review an adaptation of a work of the stature of Prince Caspian without being familiar with the basics of the overall series. These are hardly obscure factoids–she is blithely unaware of major story elements. Lazy!

The Alphabet Meme

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Picked this meme up from Melanie, in honor of two YA books I read for work this weekend.

The goal of this is to list favourite authors according to last name (with a representative fave book as well).

Atwood, Margaret — Cat’s Eye
Bronte, Charlotte — Jane Eyre
Card, Orson Scott — Ender’s Game
Dragonwagon, Crescent — The Year It Rained (with Paul Zindel)
Eager, Edward — Half Magic
Forster, EM — Howard’s End
Gibson, William — Neuromancer
Hobb, Robin — Ship of Magic
Ishiguro, Kazuo — And Never Let Me Go
Jackson, Shirley — Hangsaman
King, Stephen — The Gunslinger
Lewis, CS — Till We Have Faces
Martin, George RR — Game of Thrones
Novik, Naomi — His Majesty’s Dragon
Oates, Joyce Carol — Blonde
Percy, Walker — The Last Gentleman
Queenan, Joe — If You’re Talking to Me, Your Career Must Be in Trouble
Rendell, Ruth — Judgment in Stone
Smith, Wesley — Culture of Death
Tolkien, JRR — The Return of the King
Undset, Sigrid — Kristin Lavransdatter
Vine, Barbara — A Dark-Adapted Eye
Wharton, Edith — Twilight Sleep
X — I’ll read the next book someone recommends by an author whose last name starts with X.
Yancey, Phillip — Where is God When It Hurts?
Zarr, Sara — Story of a Girl

Top 20 Meme

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Picked this up from Becky:

The rules: Top twenty favourite books in no particular order. Don’t think about it for too long. Take twenty minutes only to compile your list. Bold the ones you’ve read, or reread, since you’ve started blogging. Include novels, non fiction and plays.

1. The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
2. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
3. Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
4. Wolves of the Calla by Stephen King
5. Ship of Magic by Robin Hobb
6. Till We Have Faces by CS Lewis
7. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
8. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
9. Arcadia by Tom Stoppard
10. Asylum by Patrick McGrath
11. Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier
12. Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy
13. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
14. Hangsaman by Shirley Jackson
15. Private Demons by Judy Oppenheimer
16. Bird by Bird by Anne LaMott
17. The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris
18. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis
19. The Long Emergency by James Howard Kunstler
20. Birth at Home by Sheila Kitzinger

Non Fiction Meme

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I’m late getting to Gautami’s Non Fiction Meme.

* a) What issues/topic interests you most in non-fiction, i.e, cooking, knitting, stitching, there are infinite topics that have nothing to do with novels? Books about food, books that explain scientific topics for general readers, biography, memoir, history, travelogues.

I love reading books about my hobbies, particularly knitting and cooking. My library is filled with books of film history, criticism, and theory. I like some books on Christianity by authors like CS Lewis and Dan Allender.

Lately I’ve been reading books on natural family living and breastfeeding because I’m interested in becoming a post-partum doula. I also enjoy reading about natural childbirth and the politics of childbirth and breastfeeding.

I went through a true crime phase in my 20s, but I can’t stomach them now. Small Sacrifices was a particular favorite.

I also like a good muckraking read, like Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation.

* b) Would you like to review books concerning those?

I’ve been reviewing some crafting books here, and I’d love to review some cookbooks!

* c) Would you like to be paid or do it as interest or hobby? Tell reasons for what ever you choose.

I have fantasies about reviewing for the New York Times, but right now it’s just a hobby. I’ve done film reviewing professionally, however, and enjoyed it.

* d) Would you recommend those to your friends and how?

I’m the queen of recommending books–it’s a big reason why I blog!

* e) If you have already done something like this, link it to your post.

Browse the tags below-

* f) Please don’t forget to link back here or whoever tags you.

I found it at Shelf Life, A Reader’s Journal, and Framed and Booked.

May I Introduce… (Booking Through Thursday)

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  • btt button
    1. How did you come across your favorite author(s)? Recommended by a friend? Stumbled across at a bookstore? A book given to you as a gift?
    2. Was it love at first sight? Or did the love affair evolve over a long acquaintance?

    You can find my favorite authors listed in the first sidebar column. Here’s a rundown of how I met them all:

    • CS Lewis–My father read the Chronicles of Narnia to me when was a little girl. For my 6th birthday, I had a cake featuring the old cover art from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. In college, I attended a two-week symposium in Cambridge, England, sponsored by the CS Lewis Institute, and that’s where I fell in love with his non-fiction.
    • Edith Wharton–I hated Ethan Frome, but fell in lover with Age of Innocence in college. I tore through the rest of her books. Still don’t like Ethan Frome, though.
    • Flannery O’Connor love came from reading Wise Blood in high school.
    • Jane Austen–now that’s an interesting case. I had to read Pride and Prejudice in ninth grade and hated it. Just a few years ago, I decided to give her another chance, and read Sense and Sensibility. I adored it, and adored all the rest of her books… including Pride and Prejudice.
    • JRR Tolkien love grew from a lifelong adoration of Middle Earth from reading The Hobbit and watching the animated movies. On that same trip to Cambridge, I read The Lord of the Rings for the first time and my passion was sealed.
    • Patricia Highsmith, Ruth Rendell, and Barbara Vine were library reads. I had heard good things about them, and decided to take a chance.
    • Shirley Jackson I picked up while working in development for a film producer. We were looking for material and somebody suggested I check out her work. Ah, me! One taste and I was lost. I found a book scout in Canada who tracked down all her out of print books for me.
    • Susan Cooper’s The Dark Is Rising was assigned reading in sixth grade. I immediately got my hands on the rest of the series, and have since reread it several times. I can’t wait to introduce them to Bean.
    • Walker Percy was yet another author I discovered in Cambridge. I read Lost in the Cosmos, then his fiction, then the rest of his non-fiction essays on semiotics. He played a big part in forming my identity in my early 20s.

    You may also notice I have a list of Author Sites I Love. Here’s how I met those folks:

    • Dan Allender was thanks to counseling with a former pastor.
    • David Bordwell from a grad school course on film narrative.
    • George RR Martin was a recommendation from my best friend from college.
    • Jeffrey Overstreet is a great blogger.
    • Laurie Halse Anderson wrote Speak, and there’s a whole story about me and that book that I’ll save for another day.
    • Libba Bray was recommended to me by an eighth grader at my old high school. I did a speaking engagement, and this girl was my mini-me–frizzy hair, socially awkward, and a huge bookworm.
    • Madeleine L’Engle I’ve blogged about before, in a post on books that evoked a strong emotional reaction in me.
    • Robin Hobb was a recommendation from the girlfriend of a college friend of my husband’s. This guy teases Melissa for reading what he calls “vampires in space” books. My husband likes to say, “How can you write a book about a dragon?” She and I hit it off immediately.
    • Save the Cat! is the site of a recent book on screenwriting that my manager made me read. I wish I had read it ages ago… it really does live up to its own hype.
    • Scott Westerfeld was discovered by me during a search to find young adult books that would make great movies. The Uglies series is being made into a movie, though not with me.
    • Stephen King saved my life freshman year in college, before I made friends and a life. I whiled away many a long boring night with one of his gazillions of books, checked out of the library.
    • T. Greenwood’s book Nearer than the Sky is quite special to me. A friend and I have an option on it and hope to turn it into a movie.

    And there you have it–wow, it’s amazing what I can do while the baby takes a nap!

    • Essential Books For Children

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    I want to start a conversation about what readers think are the books that no child should be without. I’m building a library for Superfast Baby, and here are my 10 must haves for boys and 10 must haves for girls:

    Boys:
    1. The Harry Potter series by JK Rowling
    2. A House with a Clock in its Walls by John Bellairs
    3. Don’t Care High by Gordon Korman Continue reading →

    The Books of My Life

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    Here’s another meme (HT Poodlerat) that’s been going around that I’m finally able to do. Last night’s book read was an incredibly tedious memoir. Thanks for sharing!

    A book that made you cry: A book that seems to make a lot of my lists: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle.

    A book that scared you: Hostage to the Devil by Malachi Martin. It’s five accounts of supposedly true possession and exorcism accounts, and it scared me so bad that I read it twice then gave it away in case I was tempted to read it a third time. Continue reading →

    The Cross (Kristin Lavransdatter 3) by Sigrid Undset

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    Synopsis:
    As her seven sons grow to manhood in 13th Century Norway, Kristin finds her marriage tested by long-simmering resentments, and struggles with her passage into senescence.

    Review:
    This might be my favorite of all three Kristin Lavransdatter books, because I think Undset is operating at the peak of her narrative powers. She really brings to life a time in Kristin’s life that isn’t as readily appealing as Kristin’s passage into womanhood, and the novelty of Kristin and Erlend’s life together has worn off. In that way, reading The Cross is like experiencing a mature marriage, from what I can imagine. It’s no longer new, yet surprises and delight still exist if you have the patience to endure. Continue reading →