Tolkien's Criticism of The Chronicles of Narnia
Posted: January 28th, 2006, 4:33 pm
I know this has been discussed here before, but I'm not clear on all of the details. Why did Tolkien not have a very high appraisal of Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia? I remember reading that one of the reasons was that he disliked Lewis' combining elements of many mythologies in the stories, e.g. Greek, Roman, King Arthur, Norse, and others. The story ofThe Lord of the Rings seem more as if it came from one single mythology that Tolkien created, whereas Lewis used other sources in creating characters, settings, etc. But I don't think there's anything wrong with the ingredients of the Narnia series-- especially since Lewis was an effective storyteller. Does anyone have a different opinion?
Larry W.
Larry W.