A little recycling

On my old blog, Bookspring, I used to post under a heading called Musings every once in a while. I've decided to bring one particular bit of Musings back as I've noticed that people are now talking about what I mentioned there three years ago. Laura Miller touches on childhood versus adulthood reading in her book, The Magician's Book and an article byMichelle Slatalla in The New York Times is entirely devoted to the issue. So, since it seems to be one of the literary topics of the day and since I seem to have been the one of the early birds on this band wagon, I'll re-post here my musings from October 4, 2005.

Musings

I wonder. Why is reading such a different experience as an adult than it is as a child? Children put their imaginations to use so skillfully when reading. As an adult, I'm not sure I have ever been so engrossed in a novel as I was when I was a child reading Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I'm quite sure I have never read a book in a single afternoon at the library as I did with one of Beverly Cleary's wonderful children's chapter books.

I still love to read, but it is a different experience. A book can interest me, even absorb me, but still not fully envelop me.

Recently, I had been longing to read a great book, the kind of book that makes you feel like you've been sucked into an alternate universe. So, of course, I was on the look-out for one. One day when I was downtown I managed to find a popular book on the shelf of the library. I began reading the book across the street on the terrace of a restaurant, shaded from the sun by a large umbrella over my table. The book, Girl With the Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier, is a story about a Dutch maid in the painter Vermeer's household during the 17th century. It was intriguing. Despite its stains and tattered condition it was good company. Whenever I left the book I found myself wanting to return to it. But it still wasn't the consuming experience of my childhood. That seems no longer possible.

And, yet, I wonder. Is it the same for all adults? If a person is never encouraged to read as a child, has he missed the only opportunity in life for such an experience? What is reading like for a person who only became a bookworm as an adult? I read raves about books on a literarature-related website I frequent and I wonder how those readers seem to still have the experiences that ended for me as youth did.

Maybe it's just the cynicism of adulthood, the lack of being able to suspend disbelief. Maybe it's chemical - perhaps there is a biological reason children get so absorbed in books and not adults. We live too much on the surface, as has been said. I don't know.

Reading continues to give me pleasure. It provides me with entertainment and information. I recommend it. But, still, I wonder.

The Magician's Book, A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller - Comments and a Review

The Magician's Book, A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller is the author's reflections on and reminiscences about reading CS Lewis's Narnia books with a lot of history and literary criticism thrown in. A quote from Anne Lamott on the front inside flap praises the book and states "I couldn't put it down."

I had to put it down. But that was just for a while. I was glad when I picked it up again and continued to hear alternate views on the famous children's author. Many people are familiar with the kindly picture of CS Lewis as an Oxford don who would reply to the children who wrote fan letters to him about his Chronicles of Narnia. So often in life, where there's a good side seen by the world there is often a less appealing underside. At least, there are those who like to talk about an underside. And whether you feel their version of the story is accurate is up to you. Perhaps that's why so many biographies are subtitled 'a life.' It's person A's account of another's existence. Person B may write another very different account. Same subject, different lives - life A and life B.

I had heard about CS Lewis's life A: the curmudgeon who converted to Christianity, wrote apologetics for the faith, created a beloved series of kids' books, taught at Cambridge and Oxford and is criticized for his treatment of females in the Chronicles. I hadn't heard of CS Lewis the raunchy incredibly human (ie, flawed) man of life B. Sadomasochistic feelings?

But such a, once more, human depiction of Lewis I was not prepared for. Indeed, more human than one would want it to be. I put the book down; it was too much to absorb at once. Miller does an excellent job painting this layered and complex picture of a real person. This is not a fawning paean to the man, but Miller does give credit when she feels it's due. She goes into Lewis's childhood, a necessity to explain the adult he was, and indepth into the histories of his friend Tolkien and other readers of the Chronicles.

That's perhaps one of the most interesting things about this criticism/memoir/
biography. Hearing about Tiffany's and Pam's experiences as readers of the Chronicles, voices that may have been unheard on this subject if not for their inclusion in this book, is a great part of the pleasure of reading it. Then there are the readers who became famous authors in their own right, like Neil Gaiman, Susanna Clarke and Jonathan Franzen. These many personal accounts of how Lewis affected their young lives and had effects on their older lives are quite interesting.

Miller's own experiences make for an absorbing first few chapters. Then, for a Narnia lover, there's the shock of so much criticism of Lewis: he never matured (an assertion by others that Miller references rather than makes herself), he liked risque stories and jokes, he had sadomasochistic feeling (which he, Miller states, fought), he was snobby. And for each of these assertions Miller makes her case by providing ample background information and weaving it into a readable story with some clever and effective turns of phrase.

Lovers of Lewis will be miffed. Haters will be satisfied. General interest readers will be engaged save for a few dry spots which they may be inclined to gloss over, although information will be lost by doing such.

I am now looking forward to one day reading a literary response to this book. I have six pages of notes. Perhaps I'll write it.

Thanks to Hachette for this complementary review copy.

Hey, it's just a story!

After a brief sabbatical during which I read Anelli's Harry, A History, I am back to reading Miller's The Magician's Book. How different they are! Anelli's book is a paean to all Potter things Rowling-approved. Miller's is genuine criticism in the personal and literary senses.

I keep finding things I want to write about as I read the book. So, on the heels of my humble self-correction below, I thought I'd go back to criticizing.

Consider this sentence from page 158 in the chapter entitled Blood Will Out.

"[The Narnia stories] take place in a dream world where talking beavers bake marmalade rolls despite having no surplus goods to trade for oranges and sugar, commodities that can only have been imported from a warmer land."

Miller then goes on to make several points about the illogical logistics of Lewis's "slapdash creation."

We are talking about children's fiction are we not, or did I miss something? Miller seems to be taking apart the world of Narnia - the fictional world of Narnia - the way a Trekkie dissects the United Federation of Planets. Only for a Star Trek fan that makes sense since it's meant to be thoughtfully considered, a safe way to comment on the real life we all live through the safety of fantasy. I doubt that when Lewis called his story a "supposal" of an alternate world he meant for readers to nit-pick about where ingredients for baked goods came from for Mrs Beaver. He was probably talking about more weighty, theological matters. If you're going to critique so far as the most minute aspects of daily fictional life for these characters, perhaps you've lost the Narnia forest for the talking trees.

Miller's readable prose does reveal some things about Lewis that, perhaps, we'd rather not know. Perhaps. So maybe I should be grateful for these silly asides which take the focus away from weightier issues like sado-masochism and prejudice. After all, it did give me material for another post. And the reference to marmalade rolls did provide delicious imagery. But, hey, this truly belongs under the 'it's just a story' heading.

I wonder as I wander or, I'm pensive as I peruse

The Magician's Book, A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller is a weighty piece of literary criticism, not in the sense of being so scholarly that a casual reader wouldn't want to approach it, but rather because it calls into question a figure from children's literature who is very dear to many. This is, of course, the author of the Narnia books, C.S. Lewis.

To a lot of people, Lewis seems to be a curmudgeonly figure from history, a kindly and nearly lifelong bachelor who wrote stories for children and responded when his young fans penned letters to him, a man who literally wrote the book on Christianity (or at least a really famous one) with his Mere Christianity, a sort of meditation on and explanation of his faith.

Certainly, this image is preferable to the flawed individual who emerges from the pages of the first half of The Magician's Book. There's nothing new in being imperfect. Most of us know we all belong to that club. But a benign and almost purified light is so often thrown on Lewis. The tales of Narnia are moving and lovable and crystallize so much of what we imagine Lewis to have been; it is, therefore, difficult to stomach an ambivalent take on the spinner of these tales.

As a lover of Narnia I think I am not alone in wishing that Miller's book could be a happier criticism of the series. Not being a Lewis scholar I am not qualified to say which view of Clive Staples is the more accurate one. I can only express the heaviness that is causing me to put aside this book for a time while I recoup my fortitude for the rest of it. A fun romp through a reader's imagination would have been more fun.

But it wouldn't necessarily have been more thought-provoking. So I must acknowledge that the issues brought up thus far in my reading of this book (like prejudice, misogyny, crafting a story that spreads religious doctrine) are important to discuss. And they are discussed well; that is, they are thoughtfully represented, appear professionally researched and spiced up with references to works of literature and talks with readers and writers. In addition, the author delivers what she promises in the subtitle; she tells us of her relationship with the Narnia books - her Narnia adventures - as she gives us a memoir of this significant portion of her reading life. Readers like to read about readers, so this is most welcome.

The title of Miller's book does identify her as a skeptic, so it should come as little surprise to anyone that there is criticism here. And this, I have found in scanning reviews from other sites and blogs, has prompted bloggers to caution Narnia lovers that they may not want to read The Magician's Book lest it affect their own further experiences of the Chronicles.

How can anyone dare to say that any particular book is one not to be read or, conversely, must be read? We can just guide a little, give some suggestions. And keep in mind any suggestions I give are based on my thoughts at the midpoint of Miller's book. So let me tell you this way, if I were talking about pastry I'd say don't expect meringue; realize that it's more like fruit cake. Be prepared to eat, taste and digest. And then do it again.

And when I do it again, I'll be back with my final thoughts on The Magician's Book.


Thanks to Hachette for this complimentary review copy.