Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Misty Noon



I finished a chapter before lunch so I took a walk in the woods by my house, always good for sorting thoughts. Showers and walks are great for ideas. I've been really low energy the rest of the afternoon though. Clementine and I sewed baby monsters, until she lost interest and started acting out The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe with her toys. We've just finished reading it, kind of a fluke. She saw the theater poster and inquired, so Jim started reading it to her online, and she was riveted. We bought the book, and raced through it over the course of several bedtimes, making some major adjustments toward the end, as you may imagine. Ahem. 

But aside from the violence of that one part, it's really little-kid friendly and such a speedy read. I'd forgotten how simple and streamlined it is. And fun. I wish I had a video of how giddy and spastic with delight Clementine was when we got to Susan and Lucy's ride on Aslan to the White Witch's castle, where he goes around breathing all the statues back to life. She was kicking her legs in bed, giggling madly, triumphant. Peals of laughter, grin so giant it was comical, unreal. Especially for Mr. Tumnus. It was the most awesome response to a story that I think I have ever seen, ever, from anyone :-)

I haven't read it in ages and ages. And I have to say that, having heard so much over the past years about the religious themes, I kind of expected to be annoyed by it, but I wasn't, for the simple reason that it is not intrusive or heavy-handed. It may be there, I don't feel like analyzing it, but it can easily be ignored, if one so chooses. 

Not much of a post here. Just some fog and fatigue. Early bed, I think. *yawn* 

Good night!






17 comments:

Terri said...

What a beautiful photo! The trees look like the Pacific Northwest, but the building seems to have come from England. I may have to look at The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe again - based on Clementine's recommendation!

Anonymous said...

I love the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe! :) And the rest of the series is worth a read as well.

HelenPeters said...

I love the photo - so atmospheric and evocative. I can almost smell that wood. And how wonderful that Clementine responded so delightedly to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. I too hadn't read it for decades until I read it to my children, then aged about six and four, a few years ago and, like you, I was surprised at how little-kid-friendly it was. They too loved it and it has remained vivid in their minds. It's such a wonderful book to be part of a child's store of mythology and imagery.
Thank you for all your blog posts, by the way - they always add something positive to my day!

Anonymous said...

I love both the picture and the story! It reminds me of how much fun reading really is - I often feel like I need to go out for a run or something during a good part of a book, just so I can wiggle around in excitement. :)

Where was this picture taken? It's gorgeous!!

anne said...

just recently, listened to the entire Chronicles of Narnia on cd while driving back and forth to chemo and other medical things. Think LWR my fave in the series, altho Horse and His Boy is quite excellent as well. Heck, they all have awesomeness, tho I was less thrilled w/the final book this time -- it is a bit less hard to "ignore" the possible religious bent of that story. :)
Would have loved to have seen Pie's response to those great parts, I too feel triumph and joy when Aslan breathes on the animals, etc :)
hooray for simple stories, simple joys!

Anonymous said...

The religious themes in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe is what makes the series so great and worthwhile. I see no reason why anyone would ever want to ignore something so wonderful. It's the good news for crying out loud! If Aslan hadn't let himself be killed, Edmund would have died=if Jesus hadn't let himself be crucified, we would all surely die fully in our transgressions. Let us not turn our heads away from what C.S. Lewis was trying to tell us all!

Stephanie Perkins said...

I had that same reaction when I was her age! That's why my cat's name is Mr. Tumnus. ;-)

Christina Carnoy said...

I love those books! I've re-read them multiple times since I was a little girl...I am currently reading your new book, "Days of Blood and Starlight" and I just have to say "Wow!" How the heck did you dream into creation the wonderful creatures and characters and places that you have brought to life in this trilogy? I am really wonderstruck!!! Fascinated, and enjoying myself immensely!!!

Mark said...

The only bad thing about hearing from your favorite authors is hearing things like this...it seems everyone is tolerant of everything anymore except Jesus. They'll tolerate most forms of depravity but somehow the most loving being in the whole of the universe is offensive. C.S. Lewis was a very prominent Christian figure, so why be offended at the Christian themes embedded in such wonderful stories? I love your books Laini, why turn your nose up at Christianity. I would assume that many of your readers are Christian people or at least people who identify with Christianity.

Tiffany Marie said...

Laini,

Oh, I didn't consider reading this one to our son. We should! Thanks for the recommendation.

Though we read books to our son that may contain some minor religious themes, we read lots of mythology to him and he understands it as such.

We won't introduce religion to our son until after he's 8, the supposed age of reason, so that he can form his own opinion about it and not have it foisted on him by others. At that time, so that he won't be ignorant of such things, we'll discuss all religions (or, rather, as many as we are aware) and their histories. Don't know if it will work as we're being thwarted by the teachers mentioning Christian themes and students talking about it. We're a nonreligious household and yet he's already coming home talking about Jesus' death and the end of the world (supposedly if Obama was reelected - grrrrrrrr - yeah, we live in NC) from school. Homeschooling or unschooling is looking more and more like the right thing to do.
Age of reason http://www.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=7241

Anyway, saw this and thought you and Clementine may like to try this project for Valentine's Day.
http://www.positivelysplendid.com/2011/01/valentine-project-for-little-ones.html
http://www.hillcitybride.com/2010/11/diy-from-pulp-art-plantable-paper/

Hugs,

Tiffany

Laini Taylor said...

Dear Mark, I am sorry to have phrased this glibly and seemed to insult Christians. That was not my intention. It was a hurried post, and I wasn't thinking it through. In fact, a story packed with overt, heavy-handed Christian doctrine would be annoying to me. That doesn't mean that I take offense to Christian themes themselves (well, not all of them). I just don't want to read books that are "preachy", especially to my young child. I want to read good stories, that are overall positive, as this one is. My intention was not to insult Christianity.
I'm sorry for that.


Laini Taylor said...

Tiffany Marie, yeah, that's pretty much our goal too. We'll see how it goes! How old is your son?

Risaa Litchi said...

Oh, that's funny, I just saw the second movie this afternoon!! Narnia was one of my favorite books when I was younger and still is, and somehow I'm glad you like it too ^^

Myrna Foster said...

I'm actually reading it to my ten-year-old and my five-year-old, and we'll be reading the statue chapter tomorrow. :o)

If she loved that one, she'd probably love the others as well.

Mark said...

Thanks Laini, I appreciate that. I have loved reading your books, and it would suck to think that you didn't like Christians. There just tends to be alot of prejudice going on in the world and prejudice in any form is an ugly thing to me. No one deserves to be abused and no one has the right to abuse anyone else. Each of us are infinitely and inestimable in worth.

Tiffany Marie said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Tiffany Marie said...

Laini,

Alex is 6. :) We've nearly finished all of Hans Christian Andersen's work. I think Narnia is next. I'm excited to get started on The Golden Compass as well. I devoured that book like Bulgasari, Pulgasari and Galgameth getting together for a bender in a rail yard. I think he'll love it as well! :)

A while ago, you mentioned on Twitter that you had been in the process of searching for a school, but I think you said you weren't sure anymore after what happened at the Clackamas Mall and Newtown. What did you decide to do?

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