JF wrote:
> X-No-Archive: yes
....
> In the case of the Jack Lewis retro, The Magician's Nephew, at least he
> made a bold attempt to remedy the cock-up brought about by the success
> of LWW. As Douglas Grisham explained when he introduced TMN as the
> opening story in the Narnia Chronicles, Jack Lewis considered it the
> most im****tant of all the novels. Although authors have absolutely no
> say in the manner of their publishers' design and presentation of their
> work, Harpic Collins did, at least, honour Jack Lewis's intentions in
> the volume sequencing, and Douglas Grisham stuck to his stepfather's
> insistence that it should be the first story when he produced the
> definitive and only correct dramatisation for the Focus on the Family
> production.
>
> I'm astonished that so many have found the concept of the first book
> being volume 1, the second book being volume 2, and so on, being hard to
> grasp.
It's just as easy to grasp that the first book written is volume 1. It
introduces Aslan and Narnia, whereas the other books are written for
people who have already read it.
> The hysterical screams of: C S Lewis was horrible wrong!; C S Lewis's
> publishers were horribly wrong!; C S Lewis's stepson was horribly wrong!
> have been little short of astoni****ng. I got bored with the emperor's
> new wardrobe. With so much do***entary evidence, I didn't even need Bill
> Ockham's trusty razor to slash it to shreds.
Let me try reminding you of what Lewis wrote (thanks to John Dean for
quoting it): "I think I agree with your order (i.e. chronological) for
reading the books more than with your mother's. The series was not
planned beforehand as she thinks. When I wrote The Lion I did not know
I was going to write any more. Then I wrote P. Caspian as a sequel and
still didn't think there would be any more, and when I had done The
Voyage I felt quite sure it would be the last. But I found as I was
wrong. So perhaps it does not matter very much in which order anyone
read them."
It doesn't take any cliches to see that "it does not matter very much
in
which order anyone read them," and thus that the advice of starting
with LWW is not "stupid" and doesn't imply that Lewis was "horribly
wrong".
--
Jerry Friedman
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