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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Alzrius" data-source="post: 9459435" data-attributes="member: 8461">I just finished reading <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Manlove" target="_blank">Colin Manlove</a>'s 1993 book, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Patterning of a Fantastic World.This was another one I picked up for cheap at the permanent book sale at my local library. I read the Chronicles of Narnia a long time ago (somewhere on the order of thirty years), and remember very little of it now, so I thought this would be a fun little gem to pick up.For the most part, it was. However, having polished it off, I'm of the impression that this is less for casual fans of C. S. Lewis' work than it is for educators who want to teach his work to students. (That this is part of the "Reader's Companion" series of "Twayne's Masterwork Studies" might have been a clue to that.) The book opens with a series of overviews about Lewis's life, his beliefs, and the history of literary scholarship of his work (or lack thereof, according to the author). Likewise, the book ends with an "approaches to teaching" section that lists things such as questions to ask students about the books and indication as to which parts of the books should be read out loud (presumably during class). Even the bibliography includes a single sentence for each listed work stating the author's opinion of them.The meat of what's here, however, is analysis of the seven books of the Chronicles unto themselves. I should note that there's no summary of events for any of the books in the chapters where they're covered. Rather, the author presumes familiarity on the reader's part with each title as it's discussed. While plotlines and characters are mentioned with regularity, it's only in the course of themes and critiques. Cliff's Notes this is not.I'll admit that always hold a bit of skepticism for any instance of artistic analysis, because I've seen too many occasions where critics treat "analysis" as a chance to say "here's why my opinion is actually a fact." To Manlove's credit, he doesn't go that route, and instead offers some keen insights as to what's present in each of the books (with a conclusion that looks at them as a whole) without any hint of injecting his own biases that I saw. Rather, this is him showcasing aspects of Lewis's works that it's easy to otherwise overlook, and so appreciate them more, which is what this kind of analysis should be.</blockquote>

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