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Planet Narnia: The Seven Heavens in the Imagination of C. S. Lewis | 
 enlarge | Author: Michael Ward
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Category: Book
List Price: $29.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  11 reviews
Sales Rank: 22959
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 384
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.5
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.4
ISBN: 0195313879
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.912
EAN: 9780195313871
ASIN: 0195313879
Publication Date: January 15, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand New. Expected US delivery in 7-10 business days
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Product Description
For over half a century, scholars have laboured to show that C. S. Lewis's famed but apparently disorganised Chronicles of Narnia have an underlying symbolic coherence, pointing to such possible unifying themes as the seven sacraments, the seven deadly sins, and the seven books of Spenser's Faerie Queene. None of these explanations has won general acceptance and the structure of Narnia's symbolism has remained a mystery.
Michael Ward has finally solved the enigma. In Planet Narnia he demonstrates that medieval cosmology, a subject which fascinated Lewis throughout his life, provides the imaginative key to the seven novels. Drawing on the whole range of Lewis's writings (including previously unpublished drafts of the Chronicles), Ward reveals how the Narnia stories were designed to express the characteristics of the seven medieval planets - - Jupiter, Mars, Sol, Luna, Mercury, Venus, and Saturn - - planets which Lewis described as "spiritual symbols of permanent value" and "especially worthwhile in our own generation". Using these seven symbols, Lewis secretly constructed the Chronicles so that in each book the plot-line, the ornamental details, and, most important, the portrayal of the Christ-figure of Aslan, all serve to communicate the governing planetary personality. The cosmological theme of each Chronicle is what Lewis called 'the kappa element in romance', the atmospheric essence of a story, everywhere present but nowhere explicit. The reader inhabits this atmosphere and thus imaginatively gains connaitre knowledge of the spiritual character which the tale was created to embody.
Planet Narnia is a ground-breaking study that will provoke a major revaluation not only of the Chronicles, but of Lewis's whole literary and theological outlook. Ward uncovers a much subtler writer and thinker than has previously been recognized, whose central interests were hiddenness, immanence, and knowledge by acquaintance.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 6 more reviews...
Wonderful October 29, 2008
One of the most exciting and wonderful works of literary scholarship that I have ever read. It makes Narnia even more pleasurable (when I thought that that was not possible). And it was just as revealing for the space trilogy.
Narnia rediscovered September 18, 2008
I read the Chronicles as a boy, or most of them at least ... I could never get past the opening chapters of The Magician's Nephew. While I liked the stories a great deal, the Christian symbolism sailed right over my head until I re-read all seven of them (with greater enjoyment and understanding) as a young man and convert.
Now Michael Ward has made a convincing case for yet another layer of meaning in the Chronicles, showing that Lewis' medieval scholarship was at work as much as his Christian faith and his love of stories. The books were not a result of Lewis going soft in the head or having a bit of a lark, but rather reflect that "everything he believed was present in everything he said."
This is a two-bookmark book -- one for the text and one for the copious endnotes -- but it is as readable as it is scholarly, with some entertaining wordplay along the way, e.g., "Lewis is not Tolkien quickened any more than Tolkien is Lewis prolonged." Planet Narnia explains the Chronicles without explaining them away; in fact I have returned to them with still more appreciation for the stories, their author, and the God whose glory the heavens tell.
Thank you, Michael Ward, for a book I will be recommending for years to come.
Converted Skeptic July 17, 2008
Ward has discovered something amazing. Not only is his book authoritative and convincing, but Ward is himself a clear, entertaining writer. Planet Narnia is simply, a good story well told as well as a good point well argued. My highest compliment is that Ward himself write in a format that demonstrates as it unfolds layer by layer to a revelatory conclusion, by Jove!
I thought "Yeah, right" -- until I read it. May 19, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
A deeper hidden meaning behind Narnia? "Yeah, right."
That's what I thought -- until I read the book.
Actually, that's not quite true either. I thought this only until I read Ward's FAQ on planetnarnia.com. Call me a sucker, but I think I was already hooked by about question 6. By hooked I don't mean I'd already accepted his theory line and sinker, but I knew I had to get me this book.
Book finally in hand, I decided I'd better start reading with my "skeptic's glasses" firmly in place. If I kept them on, I reasoned, and still came out the other end believing Ward's theory, there must be something to it. Well, my glasses came off about half way through Chapter 1.
Even aside from the content, Ward's clear style, his sincere tone, his obvious love as well as deep knowledge of Lewis's work -- all these contribute to making this fairly academic work very readable and (to me) incredibly interesting.
Ward's work opened my eyes to a whole bunch of stuff I'd never noticed in the Chronicles before. Not to mention the Ransom Trilogy and other of Lewis's writings.
One thing I considered a weakness was how Ward mentions that certain groups of words (say "swift" and "run" in HHB) are used very frequently in one particular Chronicle. But often he doesn't state that those words are not used with that frequency in the other Chronicles, so I wondered whether it proved anything.
I mentioned as much to Ward, who wrote me a helpful and prompt response. He said it's about the atmosphere, and the key thing is the words' context, not their number. "Context is everything," he added. And I guess he's right. (In fact, that's probably one of the main themes of the book.)
But to cut a long short -- this book is one of the most exciting non-fiction works I've read in a long time.
The Holy Grail of Lewis Scholarship April 23, 2008
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
Hold the phone: this is simply one of the greatest literary discoveries of our time, and it cannot fail to resound for decades and forever alter how Lewis is regarded in the literary world and beyond. That Michael Ward has somehow found this Holy Grail of Lewis scholarship is very hard to believe -- until one reads the book. Planet Narnia is a triumph and a cause for great celebration, not least because after fifty years, very few people still held out hope that this so-called "imaginative key" to Lewis's Narnia books ever existed in the first place. But it does exist, it does exist -- and here it is, for all to see. Well done, good and faithful scholar!
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