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Narnia Notes "Once there were four children…" so begins C.S. Lewis’ The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. It is only a slight variation from the traditional opening, "Once upon a time". The words immediately tell the reader to get ready to hear a story, but what sort of story will it be? Most readers would say something on the order of "make-believe", but Narnia is hardly "make-believe". The mark of a good book or a good story is that it is an exciting read the second, third, or fourth time. (Sometimes even better that the first!) It is not that the book changes. It is the reader who is changed. It is a simple first premise: Good books change their readers. The truth of a story, therefore, can be gauged in several ways. The first is the most obvious: a story is true if its details can be verified. If this, however, was the test of truth, all true stories would be textbooks. There are other levels of truth which appeal to more than a literal regurgitation of facts. It is as true of writing as it is with other art forms. For example, consider a picture such as a landscape. It could be a painting or a photograph. An accurate (true) rendition of a scene may be a requirement of the person who purchases such a picture. Its accuracy may be nearly as important as the frame’s dimension and the dominant colors, for it is my guess that such criterion would be of more interest to an interior decorator than the artist. A painting that is merely accurate is one that is intended not to stand out. It is intended to "fit", to fit with the sofa, to fit the palate of the room, to fit, but never to stand out. Truth, like art, never hangs quietly on a wall. The artists have placed themselves into their creations. They invite the wary and unwary to look, and with looking comes the risk of seeing a new perspective that overwhelms all others. Are the Chronicles of Narnia true? You’ll have to look. |
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The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe #1 Edmund and Lucy have been to Narnia.
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Prince Caspian
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The Magician's Nephew #2 The Attic, India, and the Boy Who was Crying
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© Robert B. Smith