Read Narnian journeys of two fans

I WISH I could have the first reading of the Narnia books again. For me, that is the test of a book that is destined to stay with you for the rest of your life. But I have re-read the Narnia books so many times since that my first impressions have been long overlayed with subsequent ones.

I’m certain that at six or seven I didn’t pick up on the religious symbolism, despite a rigorous Sunday School background. When it was explained to me a few years later I re-read the books with a sense of wonder and awe.

My favourite book, ‘The Last Battle’ has a wonderful description of the end of the Narnian world and the children’s discovery that they had found Heaven. Little in literature surpasses this depiction of Heaven, and I have returned to it for comfort many times since.

Lewis has been dismissed by many - particularly his arch critic, Philip Pullman - as a misogynist, largely for the fact that Susan isn’t allowed back to Narnia, after discovering ‘boys and make-up’. But as a girl growing up and reading the books, I didn’t feel alienated by this. I believe Lewis was attacking materialism and a worldliness that prevents you glimpsing those precious snatches of another world that are available to us all, if only we look.

I can’t wait to read Narnia to my sons. In fact my smallest son is named Edmund. And I believe that Edmund’s journey of self-discovery in Narnia, which leads him to experience at first hand God’s mercy and compassion, offers the best understanding of God’s love to be found in any boy’s book.

Rebecca Paveley is Editor of The DOOR

AFTER seeing a production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in London as a little girl I was inspired to read the book.

I can’t remember exactly how old I was at the time, but I do remember feeling that although this was a children’s book it was written accommodatingly, so there was something niggling a little deeper beneath the surface. Unlike other books it didn’t fade into the comfort of childhood, but has always remained a familiar and contemporary concept for me. Perhaps that is why, years later, films are still being made of it, because there is so much more than meets the eye.

I’ve never thought that meeting a lion would be that intimidating. Maybe that’s because my first record of one is the visual or imagined image of the gentle, wise, humble and humility-filled Aslan. And I recognised that the innocent children are his faithful sheep while the White Witch is the opposing force of evil, the seductive devil.
Even as a naïve child, I remember saying to my Dad; ‘Aslan reminds me of Jesus’. I later learned that C.S. Lewis had, of course, drawn firmly on Christian themes in the books. For a child this is a lovely and subtle way of introducing such a faith, but as an adult, it seems much more profound and allegoric.

I will always have fond memories of this book and am looking forward to the long-awaited film version! With its solid and ‘good-faith defeats evil’ message this wonderful creation will surely remain a timeless classic.

Dora Tildesley lives in the Bridge Group of parishes