1 - The Point of Narnia The Lion's World

The point of Narnia

The Lion’s World

A middle-aged bachelor teaching English Literature at Oxford proposes to publish a children’s fantasy: in most publishers’ offices, it is a proposal destined for the wastepaper basket. Yet no one could deny the extraordinary and continuing appeal of the Narnia stories – to adults as well as children. The enormous recent success of the series of films based on the books testifies to this. And even the ferocity of some critics of the books (about which there will be more to be said later) bears witness to their influence. Philip Pullman’s powerful trilogy, His Dark Materials, is confessedly part of a counter-campaign 1 – as if recognizing that, for once, God has the best tunes and the devil (or rather the world of strictly secular morality and aspiration) needs to catch up in imaginative terms...