THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
12/23/05 -- Vol. 24, No. 26, Whole Number 1314
El Presidente: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
The Power Behind El Pres: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
Back issues at http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
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Topics:
The Holiday Greeting Crisis (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Holiday Toy (pointer)
Narnia on BBC7 (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Google Library Scans (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH,
AND THE WARDROBE (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
THE BROTHERS GRIMM (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CUSP by Robert A. Metzger (book review by Joe Karpierz)
MRS. HENDERSON PRESENTS (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
This Week's Reading (THE CRYING OF LOT 49;
PAST IMPERFECT; NOVEL HISTORY; THE LION,
THE WITCH, AND THE WARDROBE; THE MONK; and
BLACK MAGIC) (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
===================================================================
TOPIC: The Holiday Greeting Crisis (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
I am fascinated by the whole holiday greeting issue this year.
This is the time of year when people are less selfish. They want
the world to run well and for people to be happy. And they tend
to express the wish other people will enjoy their life. Perhaps
it becomes a matter of habit and a little too automatic, but the
reason behind it is there. You would think that the people who
receive these wishes would be pleased to get them. This year we
seem to have a number of people who in the name of Christianity
are not happy with the situation. They are saying, "Listen, you
jerk, you are SUPPOSED to hope that I have a good time this
holiday season. Or at the very least you should lie to me and
tell me you want the best for me. AND, you little creep, you are
SUPPOSED to assume that I am Christian and celebrate the Christian
holiday. No general holiday greeting will do." Never mind that
these people who are causing the ruckus are showing no good will
to anyone; they expect that good will should be expressed to
them--sincerely or not--and it must be custom-fit to their
particular holiday, no matter what holiday anyone else
celebrates. To these people, I myself hope you have a lousy
holiday and a disastrous New Year. A year of painful cold sores
to you all and arthritis would be a definite plus. And I am
sincere. Well, mostly. To everyone else, we wish you Happy
Holidays and a Happy New Year. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: Holiday Toy (pointer)
And for you Star Wars fans who are celebrating the appropriate
holiday, you can find a pattern and directions for a "droidel" at
http://www.starwars.com/kids/activity/crafts/f20051216/index.html.
[-ecl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: Narnia on BBC7 (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Evelyn talks about the Narnia series in her column for this week.
Her column's a jim-dandy, crackerjack whiz-bang, so don't miss
it. Also I review the current film version of THE CHRONICLES OF
NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE WARDROBE. Hopefully you
will find that review is up to the usual modest standards I set
for myself.
It also should be noted that BBC7's radio programming for Boxing
Day, December 26, will be the following dramatized programs. All
times are Greenwich Mean Time (UTC). That makes some of this
programming inconvenient for live-listening on this side of the
pond. *However*, for the Tuesday to Sunday afterward these
programs can be downloaded at your convenience from
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbc7/listenagain/monday/.
08:00-10:30
The Magician's Nephew
The first of CS Lewis' Narnia books. A lion sings a new world
into existence, but a dark treachery threatens its future.
10:30-13:00
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
A forgotten wardrobe becomes the pathway to adventure and
intrigue, as four children step into another time and place.
13:00-16:05
The Horse and His Boy
When a slave makes his escape with a talking horse, a mysterious
lion shadows their every move. A prince wages war on Narnia.
16:05-19:15
Prince Caspian
A young prince learns the truth about his father's murder and
four strangers from another world are thrown into war.
19:15-20:15
The Northern Irish Man in C. S. Lewis
A fascinating account of author C. S. Lewis's boyhood in Northern
Ireland, and how it inspired the magical stories of Narnia.
[-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: Google Library Scans (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Two weeks ago I wrote about Google's breaking down of barriers in
communication. I expressed the opinion that like most new
technology there are people who benefit from it and people who
will be hurt by it. But I considered that overall Google's
information innovations were a good thing. In general I am more
favorable toward Google than toward other technology companies.
In specific I have more respect for Google than for certain other
company that shall remain nameless, but is a leader in providing
various software tools including operating systems and a browser
for PCs.
A friend wanted to know my thoughts on Google's project scanning
copyrighted material and asking unwilling publishers/writers to
"opt out" rather than asking their permission before scanning
anything.
See http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6285495.html.
Google is involved in litigation with publishers about the
subject currently. My opinion, for what it is worth, is that
Google is providing a service not only to their users, but also
to the publishers. Let me explain.
This brouhaha is very much like the film exhibitors' reaction to
home video in the 1970s. Some thought it would destroy their
business. After all, if people could see films in their homes
they would not have to go to the theater to see them. Well, home
video came in, and the movie theaters did not go under. In fact,
until recently they did very well by home video. Home video
increased or at the very least sustained interest in cinema. If
it was a threat it has been a long time in coming. It may be
that early release of films to video is going to be the threat that
the exhibitors feared thirty years ago. The home cinema
experience is getting better and the theater experience is getting
worse. This is a digression but I think movie theaters have to
clean their floors and police unruly audiences to improve the
movie going experience or home video will eat their business. But
until recently home video and theater exhibitors have happily
co-existed, counter to some people's expectation.
The same sort of thing seems to be gripping the publishing
industry with Google's plan. Some authors love it and some hate
it. Some people think it will be disaster and some think it will
be terrific for publishing. We will have to wait a few years and
see the net effect. Like the home video example it may be
decades before we can tell. What is the upside for publishers
and authors? All of a sudden people using Google tools are
finding the books that have not currently in prominent places in
bookstores. Books have a natural bookstore run, frequently a
matter of months, and then are off the store shelves and
gathering dust. A featured book in your bookstore right now may
not be available in a year or may be available only by special
order. With Google scanning libraries suddenly some older books
are in demand again or possibly even for the first time. People
are finding them through the new Google capability.
I, for one, may get a copy of a book that cites my mathematical
work. It republishes a paper one of my professors wrote thirty-
four years ago. He mentioned my help. But I never knew where
the paper appeared until Google told me. Now I may purchase the
book. This is an example of Google creating demand for otherwise
obscure books.
Google, however, would give me only a three-page or so
neighborhood of the mention of me that it found. I cannot get
the entire book. The capability of users getting free short
excepts from Google will affect different authors in different
ways, depending on the nature of the book. For some books
getting a three-page view may be all a user needs. Nobody needs
more than one or two pages at a time from a dictionary or a
cookbook. From a novel a three-page excerpt is just about
useless.
What Google has provided is really an electronic implementation
of an old capability, that of having a bookstore where you can
browse books and find the one you want. Amazon has a similar
capability for books that it stocks. Physical bookstores may have
some problems because people will be able to find the books and
then order them online without ever having a physical copy of the
book in hand. They can bypass the bookstores altogether. Some
people may find a book they want online and then go to the
bookstore to buy it. It may help bookstores. It may hurt them.
Those are pretty much the breaks of the bookselling business.
Publishers know that this might help them and might hurt them.
They really do not know which for the moment. They are insecure
and are looking for a nice safe piece of the action so they are
sure that they will survive. But they have been allowing people
to browse the books in bookstores for years, and it would have
been foolish for them to resist that. Right now they are
jockeying to make additional profit from the Google capability.
This is insurance against the possibility that the Google
capability will hurt them in the long run. Still, they would be
really foolish to withhold permission from Google. It would mean
they are giving away whatever free exposure they could be getting
from he new capability. Google knows that and the publishers know
that. I suspect that no matter how much complaining we hear no
major publisher is ever going to opt-out of Google's scans. They
will shake whatever money they can out of the tree (hoping,
perhaps, for a cash settlement) and then quietly let the matter
drop. It might even serve them right if Google decided not to
scan their books. Then they would probably sue to be included
like the others. They will need the exposure to sell their books.
Public libraries are actually more of a threat to the publishers
than Google scanning books is. Libraries buy one copy of the book
and then any number of people can access the entire book free of
charge. Some publishers have wanted to put libraries on a pay-
per-view approach. They are trying that in Britain. But nobody
in this country wants to implement such an accounting-heavy
process.
Technology companies like Google are really shaking things up, as
I said in the previous article, and a lot of currently comfortable
businesses will not be so comfortable. As one of the nameless
masses I stand to benefit from what Google is doing. People like
realtors and newspapers and perhaps book publishers are going to
have to make out as well as they can after the shakeup. But then
all of us will. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE
WARDROBE (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Disney Studios brings the best known chapter of
C. S. Lewis's "Narnia" books to the screen. Shooting in New
Zealand is only one way in which this film mimics THE LORD OF THE
RINGS. But somehow one never really cares much for the four
children who generally just do the obvious. Aslan is a big lion,
but also just a cipher and is much less interesting than even
Kong. Rating: +1 (-4 to +4) or 6/10
Warning: this review has minor spoilers as well as insufficient
awe for a beloved children's story.
After STAR WARS proved to be a lucrative hit at the box office
Disney Studios decided to play in the same field with a me-too
production, THE BLACK HOLE. It was of considerably lower
quality. The logical series for Disney to make in response to
THE LORD OF THE RINGS is the "Narnia" series of C. S. Lewis.
Lewis supposedly wrote the series in response to THE HOBBIT by
his friend, J. R. R. Tolkien. I have to admit that after very
much liking Peter Jackson's interpretation of THE LORD OF THE
RINGS I was rather anticipating seeing what could be done with
the Narnia books. I came away with memories of cold little
scenes and big digital battles. Even knowing the story's mythic
meaning, I felt that the story came off as rather trivial. We
don't know much about the villain except that she is bad, bad,
bad, and has made the land live always in winter, but never in
Christmas. Everybody seems to know what Christmas is, but most
people do not believe in the existence of humans. If they don't
believe in humans, what exactly do they think that Christmas is?
But I am getting ahead of myself. This is the Lewis story of
four siblings who were evacuated from London during the blitz.
They are sent to the relative safety of a huge mansion in the
countryside. Life there is excruciatingly dull except for the
games the children play together. A game of Hide-and-Seek leads
the youngest, Lucy (Georgie Henley), to hide in an old wardrobe,
only to discover that behind the old coats is a gate into Narnia,
a world of mythical creatures and talking animals. Soon all four
children are in this world and are the key to the battle between
the evil White Witch and the noble ruler of the land, Aslan the
noble lion. (Would people have objected if I called him "Aslan
the talking Lion?" It is a little hard to think of him as so
noble after he cons all of his friends while conning the White
Witch.) The children are accompanied on their journey by Mr. and
Mrs. Beaver, two beavers who talk but never say their reaction to
the enormous fur coats that the children wear.
For an American film the film feels very British. (Interesting
trivia question: I can think of many American films set in
Britain, but only two British films set largely in the United
States. Those would be PHASE IV and much of GOLDFINGER. What
others are there?) It took a moment for me to realize one of the
characters was actually Father Christmas. Oddly, nobody notices
that his joyful gifts for the boys are actually lethal weapons
for the children to use, and painful weapons at that. The sword
looks like a particularly nasty piece of work.
The problem is that Aslan may be noble, but he is a long way from
being an interesting character. He is guided by philosophical
principles that are never very clear. And though he manages to
get human expressions on a lion face, he is too lofty be earn
much viewer respect. The four children also remain undeveloped
as characters. The viewer is expected to like them mostly
because they are children, but we never see very far into their
character and each follows the path of least resistance.
(Admittedly that leads the boys into a battle, but it is still
the path of least resistance.) What makes them important is not
what they think or what they do or even believe but simply who
they happen to be, the fulfillment of a convenient prophecy. The
battle scenes, which are intricate but uninvolving, show
imaginative CGI but are still not very interesting. The issue
being fought over seems to be equally unengaging. You have the
people who wanted it always winter and never Christmas against
the people who wanted some warmer weather and occasional
Christmases. Of course, since the film was shot in New Zealand,
most of the crew probably felt you could even have both at the
same time.
The film has some of the standard and expected problems of Disney
films. With few exceptions the good people are all attractive
and the bad people all unattractive. Disney films seem to have
an on-again, off-again relationship with wolves. The wolves in
this film are not the good wolves of NEVER CRY WOLF and THE
JOURNEY OF NATTY GANN. They are the mean, evil wolves of BEAUTY
AND THE BEAST.
The story is nicely visualized but just never grabbed me. I
freely admit this is just not my preferred flavor of fantasy.
The film has many problems, most probably attributable to the
original story. I give this film a disappointing +1 on the -4 to
+4 scale or 6/10. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: THE BROTHERS GRIMM (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: THE BROTHERS GRIMM is a funhouse of ideas and visual
surprises but a story with no center and virtually no characters.
It is more imaginative than the similar VAN HELSING is, but it
has many of the same faults. Terry Gilliam has to realize that
there is a lot more to film than creating unexpected and amazing
images. There is certainly enchantment here, but the story does
not do much to hold it together. Rating: 0 (-4 to +4) or 4/10
Terry Gilliam is probably a genius. He came to the world's
attention as the animator for "Monty Python's Flying Circus".
For this work there was a premium on surprising the audience.
Surprise is at the heart of most humor anyway. Gilliam has made
unexpected and bizarre images his hallmark. Most of his film
career he has been making live-action films that have the same
sense of surprise. Over the course of sixty seconds in a Gilliam
film just about anything can happen. This is a virtue of sorts,
but it also leads to stories that are not engaging. It is very
difficult for any character continuity to express itself through
the light and action show. Jonathan Pryce manages to give us a
character of interest in BRAZIL, easily Gilliam's best film. But
that is a rarity. Gilliam's take on THE BROTHERS GRIMM is
historically inaccurate and emotionally more numbing than
engaging, but it does provide him with a canvas for some amazing
images.
As is generally known, the actual Brothers Grimm were collectors
of folktales and researchers in folklore. The fairy tales that
bear their names were collected by them and transcribed into
stories. THE BROTHERS GRIMM suggests that instead they are
primarily con artists and charlatans who pose as freelance witch
hunters for hire. The year is 1796 and the invading French
occupy Germany. Mark Damon and Heath Ledger play Will and Jake
Grimm. The Brothers Grimm ply their dishonest trade, looking for
hamlets that think they have problem with the supernatural and
then they stage amazing shows of the supernatural culminating
with the brothers dramatically dispelling the evil. The
superstitious locals believe what they see. And well they might
because the Grimm Brothers use stagecraft centuries in advance of
their time. These shows would be likely be impossible even with
21st century staging.
The two brothers comically argue and fumble their way through
several comic situations until a village that has a real
supernatural problem hires them. Faced with trees that can move
on their own, Wilhelm looks in awe and concludes, "These people
are much better funded." But it is not some local performing
tricks. Apparently children are really being stolen from the
village in ways that are taken from various fairy tales. The
brothers investigate and find that they may be in over their
heads. Complicating matters are their run-ins with members of
the French army led by an inhuman commander Delatombe (Jonathan
Pryce). Also entering into the story is a statuesque trapper
Angelika (Lena Headey) who knows the real folklore of dealing
with supernatural evil.
Shot in Prague and in Ledec nad Sázavou, both in the Czech
Republic, the film has a nice authentic look that speaks of
Eastern European craftsmanship. The accents of the characters
are a bit of distraction. Most of the major actors have English
accents. The brothers themselves have British accents as
children and mostly American accents as adults.
Like THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN, the film is a scratchpad
of ideas and visual surprise. Like VAN HELSING, the pace rarely
lets up. Like SLEEPY HOLLOW, this film borrows from familiar
stories, but has little to do with their canonical versions. The
story is really sausage that is made from grinding together
various pieces of familiar Grimms' fairy tales. And to make it
more palatable, only the fairy tales most familiar to modern
audiences are used. In spite of a good cast the story is driven
by Gilliam's style and the fast pace rather than by characters.
Heath Ledger, whose current appearance in BROKEBACK MOUNTAN may
be a breakthrough performance, is too hidden under make-up as to
be unrecognizable here. I bet I know which performance he will
want remembered.
It is hard to see where this film will have an audience. Action
with no characters does not play well to the art house filmgoer.
European history will not play well to the action film crowd.
There is much in this film to admire, but it goes by too fast and
the story is almost incomprehensible. I rate it a 0 on the -4 to
+4 scale or 4/10. [-mrl]
(Available on DVD.)
===================================================================
TOPIC: CUSP by Robert A. Metzger (copyright 2005, Ace, 517pp,
$24.95, ISBN 0-441-01241-8) (book review by Joe Karpierz)
Quite frankly, I don't know what I just finished reading. It is
either one of the more brilliant hard SF novels in recent memory,
or a muddled mess--I'm not sure which. One thing's for sure--
it's full of outstanding ideas. And that is, after all, one of
the reasons to read SF. I put off writing this review for a few
days after finishing the book just to see if everything would
coalesce in my mind, or if it everything would remain flying
around.
It's all still spinning.
The novel starts in 2031, when two momentous events happen. A
solar flare/jet erupts from the sun, actually shifting its
position. At the same time, two rings running perpendicular to
each other, one across the equator and the other across the
poles, emerge from beneath the surface of the earth. All hell
breaks loose, as world governments and all of humanity try to
recover from the seismic and climatic shock.
Things really get weird here. First of all, there are
experiments to cross the Zero Point--call it a sort of Vingean
singularity, but only sort of. Humans crossing the Point will be
something greater, of course--a sort of post-human super
creature. Enter the entity called the Swirl, which is trying to
advance humanity through the merger of a human being and the
supercomputer known as CUSP. Sarah Sutherland, through the
machinations of her father, who knows more than a little about
the Swirl, as it turns out, manages to join with CUSP and go
post-Point.
Then it gets weirder. It seems that the sun is test-firing its
jet again. And the rings and their rockets (for lack of a better
term) are also test firing. It turns out that the earth and the
sun are headed to Alpha Centauri, where anyone who is left will
meet with the Alphans. These guys apparently are monitoring
civilizations about to go Post-Point in an effort to make sure
they don't go out of control. The Alphans bring the planets to
orbit around Alpha Centauri (well, either A, B, or Proxima--it
was hard to tell sometimes) in order to isolate and study them.
I won't go any further with a synopsis. There's just too much to
cover. I will say that this is the type of book that I've gone
begging for over the last ten or twenty years, and yet I felt
something missing when I finished. Oh, this book is full of
ideas. We have yet another explanation for the event that caused
the extinction of the dinosaurs, for example. The whole "let's
turn the sun and earth into giant rocket ships and send them to
Alpha Centauri", for another example. There's a bit of homage to
Kim Stanley Robinson's "Mars" trilogy thrown in. So there is
enough to keep your mind occupied.
But the action, scenes, and scenarios cut too abruptly. I went
from one chapter to the next wondering "now how did I miss THAT?"
and "where did THAT come from?". And while the story doesn't cry
out for characterization, given its nature, we know next to
nothing about most of them.
All in all, even with all the ideas, I'd rate this book a bit of
a disappointment, especially compared to PICOVERSE, Metzger's
previous outing. [-jak]
===================================================================
TOPIC: MRS. HENDERSON PRESENTS (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Dame Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins shine in this 1930s and
1940s story of a widow who turns a cinema into a theater for live
entertainment, founding an institution that becomes a symbol of
British spirit during the Blitz. This film is recommended to
anyone not offended by some tasteful nudity on the screen. This
is a warm comedy-drama, a confection of a film loosely based on
the true story of the famous Windmill Theater in London. Rating:
+3 (-4 to +4) or 9/10
A very aristocratic looking woman walks from her husband's
funeral. Without changing clothes she quietly gets in a rowboat
and rows to the middle of a pond. There in the privacy she
desired she sits crying, mourning her husband. The film has
shown us that she is a woman of great unconventionality who will
insist on having her own way of doing things.
Dame Judi Dench plays Laura Henderson, a wealthy and impulsive
widow. In the 1930s with her husband dead she decides that she
has to bury her grief in a project of some sort. On a whim she
buys an old theater and decides to run it. Her friends are
aghast at her strange enterprise, but she continues to make the
theater work. Of great importance is the choice of a proper
theater manager. She knows the right man for the job is Vivian
Van Damm (Bob Hoskins), but from the first moments the two
discover that they cannot get along and begin a bickering
relationship that will last for years. She insists on calling
Van Damm Jewish, even after he angrily informs her that he is
not.
And that is far from her last conflict. When after a successful
year or so the profits go down she decides that she will add to
the act elegant nudity in the style popular in Paris. This
causes a scandal and Mrs. Henderson has to fight the best efforts
of the government to shut her down. And then comes World War II
and she is fighting not only resistance from her own government,
but she is fighting the German government's attacks in the form
of the Blitz. But her theater is below street level, making it a
de facto air raid shelter. The theater's cause becomes not just
artistic freedom, but giving the troops the sort of entertainment
that they can appreciate. MRS. HENDERSON PRESENTS is the human
story behind the legendary theater.
A film of this sort walks a narrow line between being charming
and being maudlin. With the cause of resisting the German
military force being sixty years old, it is the rare film that
still can manage to be stirring. But director Stephen Frears
keeps the film in balance. This is a film that deftly touches a
wide range of emotions. Certainly it is by turns funny,
sentimental, and powerful. From the moment the film starts with
its 1930s style credit sequence, the viewer feels that a
delightful experience is coming. Martin Sherman's screenplay
offers delightful dialog.
For those not offended by the theme of presenting nudity
tastefully on the stage, this is a delightful film with
characters the viewer comes to really care for. There are few
surprises as to where the film is going, but the production
values and the style make this all very comfortable and likable,
a real gem. This is a film whose strongest suit is its dialog
and some charming characters. You could do much worse for a
holiday season film. I rate MRS HENDERSON PRESENTS a +3 on the
-4 to +4 scale or 9/10. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
The good thing about THE CRYING OF LOT 49 by Thomas Pynchon (ISBN
0-060-93167-1) is that it is short. The bad thing is that it is
incomprehensible, and does not even have a real ending. Having
slogged my way through this for our reading group, I now know I
can skip all the rest of Pynchon's works. Oh, there is one other
good thing--according to Charles Harris, Pynchon got all the
philately correct, or at least wrong in an explainable way. (For
example, the ink on some of the stamps seems to react to chemicals
incorrectly--but since the stamps are forgeries, that is
excusable.)
In 1996, Mark C. Carnes edited PAST IMPERFECT (ISBN
0-8050-3760-8), in which historians wrote essays about various
(historical) films. For example, Jonathan D. Spence wrote about
SHANGHAI EXPRESS, and (as an example of the broad definition of
"history" used) Stephen Jay Gould wrote about JURASSIC PARK. Now
Carnes is back, with NOVEL HISTORY (ISBN 0-684-85765-0), in which
historians write about historical novels. And this time the
novelists (well, most of them) are given a chance to respond.
Part of what this means is that you can be reasonably sure that
none of the living authors are going to be completely trashed.
On the other hand, it probably would not be worthwhile to spend
time writing essays on bad books anyway. The one problem is that
if you are not familiar with the book being discussed, then the
discussion is not very meaningful. (This was less of a problem
in PAST IMPERFECT, as the movies chosen were far more widely
known.)
Last week I read KING KONG; this week it was THE LION, THE WITCH,
AND THE WARDROBE (ISBN 0-060-76489-9). While the book KING KONG
is but a pale imitation of the movie, the movie THE CHRONICLES OF
NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE WARDROBE is not as good as
the book. However, this does not mean I think the book is great
either. But while the movie has some stunning visual scenes, it
cannot convey some of what can be done with narration. Take the
children's reaction to Aslan. When they first hear of him in the
book, Lewis writes, "And now a very curious thing happened. None
of the children knew who Aslan was any more than you do; but the
moment the Beaver had spoken these words everybody felt quite
different. Perhaps it has sometimes happened to you in a dream
that someone says something that you don't understand but in the
dream it feels as if it had some enormous meaning--either a
terrifying one which turns the whole dream into a nightmare or
else a lovely meaning too lovely to put into words, which makes
the dream so beautiful that you remember it all your life and are
always wishing you could get into that dream again. It was like
that now. At the name of Aslan each one of the children felt
something jump in his inside. Edmund felt a sensation of
mysterious horror. Peter felt suddenly brave and adventurous.
Susan felt as if some delicious smell or some delightful strain
of music had just floated by her. And Lucy got the feeling you
get when you wake up in the morning and realise that it is the
beginning of the holidays or the beginning of summer." So you
have some idea of what the children feel about Aslan. In the
movie, all you can see is that they seem oddly deferential to a
talking lion.
Lewis's background as a professor shows through in some odd ways.
When Mr. Beaver calls out, "It's all right! It isn't *her*!",
Lewis adds, "This was bad grammar of course, but that is how
beavers talk when they are excited; I mean in Narnia--in our
world they don't usually talk at all."
And in what seems far too modern for 1950 (when the book was
written), he writes "And when each person had got his (or her)
cup of tea, each person shoved back his (or her) stool. . . ."
(But I notice that Lewis's "battles are ugly when women fight"
was changed in the film to just "battles can get ugly".)
There is some irony in that the film based on Lewis's work often
seems to be a "Lord of the Rings" wannabee, because Lewis himself
had disdain for Tolkien's Middle Earth and its "non-Christian"
mythology. But when I read THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE
WARDROBE, it seems like a fairly mundane children's book, with
some heavy-handed symbolism ladled on. (And it is arguably the
best and most popular of the "Narnia" books, which makes me
wonder how well the film sequels to it will do.)
And it's worth noting a recent change in the series.
Traditionally, they have been numbered in the order of their
publication:
1) The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
2) Prince Caspian
3) The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
4) The Silver Chair
5) The Horse and His Boy
6) The Magician's Nephew
7) The Last Battle
Now, however, they have been re-ordered to match the internal
chronology:
1) The Magician's Nephew
2) The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe
3) The Horse And His Boy
4) Prince Caspian
5) The Voyage Of The Dawn Treader
6) The Silver Chair
7) The Last Battle
Which is why us old folks think of THE LION, THE WITCH, AND THE
WARDROBE as the first book, while newer readers think of it as the
second and may possibly wonder why Disney started with that one.
For those of you attracted to old classic horror novels, but put
off by the exorbitant prices these out-of-print works garner at
antiquarian books stores, good news: Matthew Lewis's THE MONK is
now available in a Dover Thrift Edition (ISBN 0-486-43214-9).
And Marjorie Bowen's BLACK MAGIC (reviewed in the 04/11/03 issue
of the MT VOID) is available as an Adobe download through
amazon.com. [-ecl]
===================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
In our country, we have those three unspeakably
precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of
conscience, and the prudence never to practice
either.
-- Mark Twain