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It's the end of Narnia as we know it
Jan. 16th, 2006 04:16 pmMy goal of re-reading the Chronicles of Narnia has now come to fruition, now that I've completed The Last Battle. ( You know the drill by now, I'm sure. )
The single-volume edition of the Chronicles also includes an essay by Lewis, entitled "On Three Ways of Writing for Children." These three ways are writing what you think children want, writing with particular children in mind, and writing a children's story because it's the best way of saying what you want to say. He refers to the first one as "generally a bad way," and I think I would have to agree. That's the kind of thinking where people use half-assed marketing research and pop psychology to come out with something that's supposedly what some narrow audience wants, and it probably results in crap more often than not. Lewis goes on to defend children's fantasy, writing, "I am almost inclined to set it up as a canon that a children's story which is enjoyed only by children is a bad children's story." He also makes a good point when he says, "They accuse of arrested development because we have not lost a taste we had in childhood. But surely arrested development consists not in refusing to lose old things but in failing to add new things?" That's part of why I tend to get annoyed when people insist they've "outgrown" some book or band or something. Perhaps the word is appropriate in certain cases, but it carries the connotation that this something must be childish and immature. I remember an argument on the alt.music.tmbg newsgroup about whether it was possible to "outgrow" They Might Be Giants. My thought on the matter was that, yes, some people stop liking them as their tastes change, and that's perfectly fine. But to use the word "outgrow" implies that people who still like TMBG as they grow older are somehow immature.
This also ties into something I was thinking of not too long ago, regarding how I see the terms "adult" and "grown-up." To me, the former is mostly a matter of responsibility, and the latter a matter of dignity. "Grown-up" seems to me to carry a sense of snootiness and imagined superiority than "adult" doesn't. Does anyone else see it that way, or am I alone?
( Yes, we do have more quiz results. )
Last night,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bethje gave me my final Christmas present, which was a DVD set of the two Ghostbusters movies. I'd been wanting to watch them again, so it was a good gift. I actually knew about it beforehand, so it wasn't a surprise or anything, but still.
The single-volume edition of the Chronicles also includes an essay by Lewis, entitled "On Three Ways of Writing for Children." These three ways are writing what you think children want, writing with particular children in mind, and writing a children's story because it's the best way of saying what you want to say. He refers to the first one as "generally a bad way," and I think I would have to agree. That's the kind of thinking where people use half-assed marketing research and pop psychology to come out with something that's supposedly what some narrow audience wants, and it probably results in crap more often than not. Lewis goes on to defend children's fantasy, writing, "I am almost inclined to set it up as a canon that a children's story which is enjoyed only by children is a bad children's story." He also makes a good point when he says, "They accuse of arrested development because we have not lost a taste we had in childhood. But surely arrested development consists not in refusing to lose old things but in failing to add new things?" That's part of why I tend to get annoyed when people insist they've "outgrown" some book or band or something. Perhaps the word is appropriate in certain cases, but it carries the connotation that this something must be childish and immature. I remember an argument on the alt.music.tmbg newsgroup about whether it was possible to "outgrow" They Might Be Giants. My thought on the matter was that, yes, some people stop liking them as their tastes change, and that's perfectly fine. But to use the word "outgrow" implies that people who still like TMBG as they grow older are somehow immature.
This also ties into something I was thinking of not too long ago, regarding how I see the terms "adult" and "grown-up." To me, the former is mostly a matter of responsibility, and the latter a matter of dignity. "Grown-up" seems to me to carry a sense of snootiness and imagined superiority than "adult" doesn't. Does anyone else see it that way, or am I alone?
( Yes, we do have more quiz results. )
Last night,
bethje gave me my final Christmas present, which was a DVD set of the two Ghostbusters movies. I'd been wanting to watch them again, so it was a good gift. I actually knew about it beforehand, so it wasn't a surprise or anything, but still.
