SDEAN23 writes:

i have heard some mixed reviews on the the lion the witch and the wardrobe. some people tell me its a christian movie, others say it's anti-christian.

That earthquake in northwestern Europe was C. S. Lewis rolling over in his grave, to hear someone refer to his opus as anti-Christian. Though in my experience (and that, inter alia, of theologian Elaine Pagels, see her book The Origin of Satan), it is Christians who are most likely to label other Christians "anti-Christian". So maybe Lewis was just letting out a big sigh.

Anyway, the Chronicles of Narnia, of which there are seven volumes (The Magician's Nephew, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Horse and His Boy, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, The Silver Chair, The Last Battle), are an explicit though not always completely consistent Christian allegory. In 25 words or less, the books follow the voyage of five English children in the faith, represented as a fantastic land on the other side of a particular clothes closet (English "wardrobe"), which only children [allegory warning] can enter. LWW has only four children; Susan eventually falls away, captured by the material world (one of the symbols of her fall is [gasp] makeup), while Edmund, who joins the story later, starts badly but [allegory warning] is saved.

Aslan (ARSLAN, n. [Turkish]: 1. lion; 2. valiant.), the central figure (yes he is a lion), is an explicit Christ image, who guides and protects the children, though this is not always immediately obvious; a key line in the series is "Aslan is not a tame lion".

The books were written for older children, but at a time (1950s), when kids in junior high and high school were taught much classical literature, and much more, in terms of reading skills, was expected of them than presently. For any child who struggles with Harry Potter, Narnia would be very difficult, in terms of the vocabulary, pace, and allusions necessary to grasp its meanings. There is perhaps a dark side to the attraction Narnia now has for adults ...

Narnia is often compared to The Lord of the Rings. The comparison extends far beyond the fact that both are middle-20th-century English fantasies. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien were contemporaries, both were professors of literature at major English universities, and both were members of the same literary club (the Inksters, if memory serves). In fact, Tolkien, who started working seriously on LotR around 1938 (it was first published in 1952 or thereabouts), once read an excerpt of an early draft at an Inksters reading - and shortly thereafter, Lewis, who hadn't had the vaguest idea before, suddenly started churning out Narnia stories. Tolkien, in his introduction to LotR, denies any allegorical meaning in his book, declaring that "I cordially dislike allegory, and have done so ever since I became old and wary enough to detect its presence" - in which I detect a breath of resentment over the Narnia episode.

But then, Tolkien would never have allowed himself to be as facile or superficial as Lewis could be. Lewis could, and did, write quickly and voluminously. He wrote scholarly papers, essays, books, and even an advice column in the newspapers - in which he, a bachelor until near the end of his life (as famously related in the TV? movie Shadowlands), doled out Christian marriage homilies. Lewis even wrote science fiction - and this too is a Tolkien story. The two, a decade before Narnia and LotR, challenged each other to produce something on the theme of "space". Tolkien got through half one story and then abandoned it as unfulfilling. Lewis produced and published three novels (Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra and That Hideous Strength).

To me, this difference in character of the two men is emblazoned in their work. Narnia is fast-paced but seems to me superficial, and not only because of its sometimes blatant allegorical stance. Its images are arresting when made but do not always make a successfully integrated whole. Lord of the Rings is slower, deeper, with many more layers, and ultimately more fulfilling because of its far richer and more honest delving into the complexities of the human condition. Its images tie together beautifully. Of course, LotR was written explicitly for adults, while Narnia was not. But maybe that's just as well. I'm not sure that Lewis would have had the patience to try and achieve what Tolkien did. I'm not sure who else would have.

Indeed, Tolkien was just another pauper academic until the day, six months after the original copyright expired, that sales of LotR exploded, making him a millionaire. Most of us would have given up long before. And Tolkien would never have gotten his money today. The copyright had expired. Another publisher had published the work. By law it, and not Tolkien, was entitled to reap the harvest. That's what would happen in 2006. But that publisher tamely recalled its books and allowed Tolkien to renew his copyright.

That might possibly be the most Christian story in the whole Narnia - Lord of the Rings saga.

[Disclaimer - the above is based on the books written by Lewis and Tolkien. I have not yet seen the LWW movie, nor part 3 of the LotR trilogy - I did manage parts 1 and 2. I confess, if I am not the world's worst movie-goer, I must certainly rank in the 90% percentile. Any embarrassing situation will send me under my chair. I live through enough of them during the day to have any desire to subject myself to more as "entertainment" of an evening.]

  - O Ceallaigh