With news that another fantasy fiction Hollywood blockbuster, perhaps similar to those based on the books of J.R.R Tolkien or J.K Rowling, would be making its box office debut sometime at the end of 2005, many an entertainment review began to talk about how C.S Lewis' The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe would compare with rival film productions. These days, the quality of the special effects is what determines whether or not such fantasy fiction movie epics become hits or fall by the wayside. Regardless, there is a strong case to be made for reading the books first simply because books give the author's own unadulterated versions of their stories and allow the reader to use his or her own imagination to its greatest potential. For C.S Lewis the stories of Narnia do not in fact start with The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe but with another epic, The Magician's Nephew.
In The Magician's Nephew, the story begins in early 20th Century London with a girl, Polly Plummer, who, together with a boy by the name of Digory, sets off on a little adventure to explore a tunnel that runs through the attic of her house. Inadvertently they end up crawling from the tunnel into the office of Digory's Uncle Andrew who launches them on a journey that sets the stage for the rest of the book. With his magical powers and eagerness to try out a set of magical rings that allow those who touch them to travel into other worlds, Uncle Andrew forces Digory and Polly to become subjects for his experiments. Sure enough, Digory and Polly quickly find themselves in Charn- a world which an evil witch, Queen Jadis, has all but destroyed with her magical powers. But as they attempt to flee back to their own world, they unwittingly bring her back to London where her intentions to conquer every land that she can lay her hands on take new meaning.
After some rather comical moments involving the witch, whose theft of a large sum of money has more than caught the attention of a rather angry London mob, Digory and Polly manage to use their magical rings to catapult themselves and the witch back out to another magical world, thus saving London from its unwanted ruler. Yet the children bring with them not only the witch but an additional entourage composed of a carriage cabby and his wife, a stolen horse by the name of Strawberry and Uncle Andrew himself. The world in which they all end up in is a world that has not yet begun- a world that consists of nothing but darkness, devoid of any other living creatures. But as a voice in the distance begins to sing, this emptiness is transformed into a universe ablaze with stars, constellations and planets, "brighter and bigger than any in our world" (p.61). As the singing continues, more of this incipient creation becomes apparent. A bright sun rising up above the horizon illuminates a river flowing eastwards while the neighboring hills become covered in grass and trees. The singing voice turns out to be none other than that of Aslan-a lion whose goodness in creation seems altogether repulsive to the evil witch. Shrieking with fear, she runs away, while the children look on in wondrous amazement at the new land rising before them.
The runaway witch becomes the focus of the adventure that unfolds. The children are given the seemingly insurmountable task of journeying to the farthest reaches of the land better known as Narnia to find a garden with an apple tree that bares a special kind of fruit- a fruit that will protect Narnia from the witch's evil influences and which they must bring back with them. Aslan gives them everything they need for the task including a winged horse by the name of Fledge (aka Strawberry) that will fly them across the forests and mountains which lie in their way. Their journey is made all the more thrilling by the scenery they encounter for these same forests and mountains make of Narnia a land that rivals any on our earth in its beauty and majesty.
As one reads The Magician's Nephew, it is all too evident at key moments in the story Lewis has borrowed scenes from the biblical creation account. The unfolding of the new world with Aslan's singing, for example, mirrors God speaking the creation into existence in the book of Genesis. At times Lewis displays a unique sense of humor even though the overall thread of the story is obviously quite serious. What is perhaps most striking about Lewis' writing is his ability to reach out to both child and adult alike in what is a story that appeals to all our senses of doing good and living a righteous life. In short, The Magician's Nephew opens up a view of the world in which a divine purpose for our lives is ever-present, ready to guide us to an end in which good conquers evil. It is an adventure story that anybody can enjoy.
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